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Under 
Old Rooftrees 



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MRS. E. B. HORNBY 



JERSEY CITY, N. J. 
137 Grant Avenue 
MCMVIII 



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W)' 



I AUG 21 1908 

01 ASS ^^t- ^"^ '^''' 

1^ I *> Of X- 






Copyright, 1908 
By Mrs. E. B. Hornby 



L. R. Benedict 



Press of Redfield Brothers 



To All Who Love Old Warwick 



It is the events occurring in the lives of indi- 
viduals, and in which they were the factors, that make up 
the history of every town and State. 

E. M. RUTTENBER. 



I 

( 



0/^ 



Index 

I — Leaves from Old Rooftrees . . 11-14 

II — Our Forefathers 17-45 

III — WooiNGs AND Weddings of Ye Old- 
en Time 49-75 

IV — Memories of Old Northern Slaves 79-112 

V — The Bygone Doctor 1 15-139 

VI — A Sister and a Brother . . . 143-161 

VII — Warwick Weather and Celestial 

Phenomena 165-177 

VIII — Drifted Down 181-208 

IX — The Wawayanda Creek . . 211-223 

X — Henry William Herbert ("Frank 

Forester") 227-238 

XI — Grandmothers' Albums and Our 

Grandsires' Effusions . . . 241-261 

XII — A Last Chapter 265-271 



I 

Leaves from Old Rooftrees 



I 



Leaves from Old Rooftrees 




PLEASANT place was the homestead of 
early days as it stood amid its green acres, 
sheltered by primeval trees. Usually built 
facing the east and south, its many-paned, 
deep-seated windows welcomed and reflected 
the first^beams of the rising sun, and the spacious low rooms 
within, with broad beam-upheld ceilings from the day of in- 
faring or crane-hanging, were the very nests of simple do- 
mestic life. The fireplaces were ample, the chimneys wide and 
aeep-throated, and the doors furnished with quaint latches, 
frequently so set that the fingers pressing them were in dan- 
ger of a pinching. Anent these, an anecdote is handed down, 
an amusing incident illustrative of the reverence of bygone 
days. In an old home was one of these nipping latches. 
Calling one day to visit an aged aunt, the fingers of a 
nephew were sharply pinched by it. "Aunt," he exclaimed, 
"why don't you have this old latch reset? It has hurt the 
fingers of enough generations." Looking at him with a 
glance of severe reproof she replied, in impressive tones, 
"Nephew, 'remove not the ancient landmark thy fathers have 
set,' is the Scripture injunction. Your great-grandfather 
placed that latch there. Would you remove it?" 

Such was the veneration of our forebears. With all their 
oddities and inconveniences, these old homes were the abid- 
ing places of hospitality and good cheer, quiet happiness, 
and usually large families of children. 
The rooftree, or ridge-pole, that mighty topmost beam 



12 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

over which the roof bent its stiff back and stretched broadly 
away to the eaves, was the crowning glory of the house and 
became in time its symbol. The weather-stained shingles 
were carefully guarded from mildew and decay, and when 
autumn had loosened the leaves of the great ancestral trees 
from the far-reaching boughs and sent them fluttering down 
upon the roof, they were carefully brushed off at intervals, 
lest they should damage the housetop. The most perfect in 
shape and rich in color were often gathered and treasured 
in the family Bible, a hymn book, or a cherished volume of 
verse. When a son or daughter left the house, it was the 
beautiful custom of the mother to give them a Bible with 
some of the leaves from the old roof pressed in its pages. 
The Good Book often contained the family tree, as well as 
the dear mementoes from the home monarchs, and the poet 
Morris has exquisitely commemorated the fact in his lines : 

For many generations past 

Here is our family tree, 
My mother's hand this Bible clasped, 

She, dying, gave it me. 

I recall a Bible with these garnered leaves laid reverently 
on comforting passages of Scripture, and on the fly-leaf 
these lines, copied by the mother who gave it to her boy : 

Remember, love, who gave thee this, 

When other days shall come. 
When she who had thy earliest kiss 

Sleeps in her narrow home. 
Remember, 'twas a mother gave 
The gift to one she'd die to save. 

That mother sought a pledge of love, 

The holiest for her son, 
And from the gifts of God above 

She chose a goodly one. 
She chose for her beloved boy 
The source of light and life and joy. 



LEAVES EROM OLD ROOFTREES 13 

And bade him keep the gift that when 

The parting hour should come, 
They might have hope to meet again 

In an eternal home ; 
She said his faith in that would be 
Sweet incense to her memory. 

And should the scoffer in his pride 

Laugh that fond faith to scorn, 
And bid him cast the pledge aside 

That he from youth had borne, 
She bade him pause and ask his breast 
If he or she had loved him best. 

A mother's blessing on her son 

Goes with this holy thing, 
The love that would retain the one 

Must to the other cling. 
Remember, 'tis no idle toy, 
A mother's gift— remember, boy. 

As the pages of that hallowed book were turned in the 
new home, what thronging memories rose at the sight of 
those faded leaves, of lullaby, of bridal song, of parting mo- 
ments, glad reunions, days of bereavement, hours of sacred 
affection and hallowed happiness. They spoke to the absent 
of all the heart holds dear, and their recollections were a 
precious legacy. 

With the lives of those whose hands reared and propped 
the rooftrees of old Warwick we have now to do, not for- 
getting in our passing the great company of kinsmen, 
friends, servants and helpers for whom the welcoming doors 
swung wide. Long, long ago, farther back than these pages 
extend, one wrote: 

'Tis a very good world to live in, 

To lend or to spend or to give in ; 

But to beg or to borrow or get a man s own, 

'Tis the very worst world that ever was known. 

Perhaps in these modern times we would say the noble 
Earl author was pessimistic, but on reviewing them care- 
fully, we may incline to beheve that 1600 and 1900 are not 
so very unlike, although the veil of centuries falls between 



14 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

them. If the days of candlelight and firelight are less inter- 
esting than those of the present, the pen is at fault, not the 
quaint and primitive happenings. Away in the wake of 
Progress we go, whether we will or not, but in our flight it 
may not be amiss sometimes to fold wings and alight, "look- 
ing backward" for a space. Nevermore shall we or those 
who come after us go back to those simple early days when 
our little woodland world was young; but in these pages, 
through the faithful jottings of a life, caught as precious 
incense from revered and beloved lips, the endeavor has 
been to bring their shadows back. Our fathers' natures are 
our natures ; habits, customs, surroundings alone are 
changed. Ours are the mountains, the fair valley, the en- 
circling hills they rescued from primeval solitude and savage 
dominion. To them we owe all we have, all we hold dear 
and enjoy to-day. Love, reverence, honor to their mem- 
ories ! 

. . . They dro-ve the plotv, they trafficked, budded, dtl-ved, they spun and 
•wove, they taught and preached, they hastened uf> and down each on his little 
errand, and their eyes were full of eager fire, as if the earth and all its vatt 
concerns were in their hands. HOLLAND, " Voices from Ye Past." 



II 



Our Forefathers 



II 



Our Forefathers 




'NE of tlie most interesting cliaracters of early 
! times was the migratory shoemaker, who jour- 
neyed from house to house, fitting out foot- 
gear for the family. When the fatted calf was 
killed, or the mighty bovine slain and disposed 
of, the hides were carried to the tannery. When they came 
back, the merry shoemaker was sent for, and his kit and 
himself occupied a corner in the ample farmhouse kitchen, 
whence the tap, tap of his busy hammer sounded from morn 
till eve. To the scattered farm homes, often far removed 
from village centers, his coming was an event, and made the 
most of as such by young and old. Secure in the possession 
of skill that guaranteed him a modest life support, sure of 
a welcome wherever he went, and withal a philosopher, as 
his compatriots are apt to be from much quiet communing 
over lap-stones, his amiability was proverbial. 

Sometimes, in the goodness of his heart, he would cut out 
covers for the boys' balls of raveled yarn, and even stitch 
them, make Baby a leather doll with extended hands and 
feet, and eyes that fulfilled the desperado's perennial threat 
to "let the daylight through," and fashion Granny a leather 
knitting-sheath, warranted to last forever. Ever generous, 
he gave the small fry a bit of black wax to chew, graciously 
spread a lump mixed with beeswax and linseed oil on a 
square of sheepskin for uncle's lame back and auntie's stitch 
in the side, made sister Polly's and Nancy's calfskins as snug 
as possible, and was an all-around light-hearted and agreea- 



i8 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

ble personage. As he sat at the chmmey lug after his day's 
work was done, the ruddy Hght of the fire playing over his 
features, he did not disdain a Httle gossip of famihes where 
he had lately worked, and so many a wedding was prema- 
turely aired, many a sick one hopelessly doomed ere the 
grim messenger had begun to sharpen or tip his dart, and 
skeletons in family closets made to stir their feet in a soft, 
uncertain manner. But nobody seemed to hold any malice 
against the jovial disciple of St. Crispin. A pleasant and 
cheerful auxiliary, he sat modestly aside and let others take 
the flafif of the fire, while he sought the faraway ear of the 
chimney and the sappy end of the backlog, and was willing 
at all times to carry in the wood to feed the hearth as the 
great fiery heart wasted it. When Caesar and Chloe came 
humbly up to be measured at his bench, he received them 
with a merry quip and smile, and manipulated the great cal- 
loused feet as kindly and gently as he did those of the pret- 
tiest daughter of the house. 

He usually exemplified the adage from time immemorial 
applied to the shoemaker's wife and children, and his worn 
footgear were objects of wonder to the little ones. 

"Why don't you wear better shoes?" a small maiden asked 
one of the guild, pegging away at his bench. 

"I never have time to make 'em," said he, whisking a 
waxed-end through deftly. 

"And who makes 'em for your little girls and boys ?" per- 
sisted the small questioner. 

"They all go barefoot," replied Crispin, solemnly, and the 
inquisitive maid was meditative a long time, and as a gray- 
haired grandmother still told how it puzzled her childish 
mind that a shoemaker's children should go barefoot. 

Shoe thread was spun by housewives and kept for use, 
and this most inofifensive article was once the innocent means 
of breaking ofiF a promising match. 

The orphan niece of a worthy farmer, not finding her life 



OUR FOREFATHERS 19 

too easy with her bustling aunt, engaged herself to- an in- 
dustrious young shoemaker, whose unmarried sister kept his 
house. The fiancee was invited to tea, and arriving about 
four one very hot afternoon, found tiie sister bending over 
the small linen wheel, spinning shoe-thread. 

"Ben is waiting for it, and hot as it is, I have to spin, 
company or no company," explained the sister. 

It set the young bride-elect to thinking deeply, and there- 
after there was a discarded lover and the sister remained as 
housekeeper. 

A lady was wont to relate with delight the experience of 
her first pair of "best shoes." They were made of prunella, 
a stuff first used for clergymen's gowns. To her unaccus- 
tomed eyes they seemed too delicate and beautiful for con- 
tact with mother earth. On Sundays she carried the treas- 
ured shoes in a package, wore a pair of old ones to the edge 
of the village, then, stopping at a friend's home, put on the 
precious prunella buskins and tripped gingerly to church, 
going through the same exchange on her way back. 

All stockings were knit, linen for summer and wool for 
W'inter w^ear, and it w^as a tradition that no girl should marry 
until she had a pillowcase full, knitted by her own hands. 
Some provident and forethoughted maidens were said to 
have knit their pillowcase full of several sizes. 

"Knitting fathoms" w-as a favorite pastime at evening p'^r- 
ties. Six lengths of yarn were measured from the ball by 
the rustic beau with the longest arms for as many of the 
bevy of damsels present as wished to enter the contest, and 
the fun commenced, the struggle being to see who could 
knit up the six fathoms most quickly. Fast and furious 
clicked the needles, rosy-red bloomed the cheeks of the ex- 
cited knitters, and the onlooking best young man secretly 
hoped for the success of the girl he favored. Loops crept 
in, knots went unheeded, stitches w^ere dropped, but victory 
and approval came to the winner. It was said prudent 



20 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

maidens kept a stocking laid by purposely for fathom con- 
tests, while less wise demoiselles spent the following day in 
ravelling and picking up stitche?. 

Making the exchange from the warm wool stocking of 
winter to the cool linen of summer often gave children colds, 
and one cautious, tender mother used to commence on the 
tenth of May to cut a small piece of wool out, and sew 
a piece of linen in, until the little feet were denuded of their 
winter covering. Who shall say the olden-time mother was 
not careful? 

It is a tradition that the first bride in the village who ever 
wore a pair of high-heeled Avhite satin slippers became the 
mother of thirteen children. Present-day maidens might be 
interested to know a little of how brides were arrayed and 
wedded in the long, long ago. 

One married in 1798 had 150 guests at the ceremony. 
Six pigs and twelve turkeys were roasted for the feast. Five . 
female slaves waited on the guests, and the merry party I 
danced till four o'clock in the morning. Cider, applejack ! 
and peach brandy were on the sideboard. Generous neigh- 
bors lent a helping hand in contributing to the feast, and 
several friendlv Dutch ovens in near-by farmhouses assisted 
in baking three hundred rusk, as many biscuit, and the tow- 
ering piles of bread and cake. Branches of evergreen, in- 
terspersed with sprigs of the same dampened and rolled in 
flour until snowy white, were used to trim the room. The 
floor was sanded in "herringbone" pattern. The bride wore 
a scarlet camlet petticoat and a white dimity shortgown ; a 
string of amber beads encircled her neck. The bracelets on 
her wrists were of velvet, embroidered with pale blue beads. 
It is worthy to be recorded that her husband bought a farm 
a few miles out of town, for which they started to take up \ 
their abode in the second year of their wedded life, and 
while on the way her first son was born in the big farm 



OUR FOREFATHERS 21 

wagon, grew to be a useful citizen, and was a lifelong lover 
and judge of horses. 

A later bride wore lilac silk, a high brass comb in her 
hair, a scarf around her neck of silk lioss, strung at inter- 
vals with fine glass beads, and ornaments of glass blown in 
the shape of bunches of grapes with tiny leaves, filled with 
white wax. This style of "imitation pearl," as it was called, 
was common to early days and was really very pretty and 
delicate. This bride wore twelve yards of ruffling, stiffly 
starched and crimped, on her wedding nightcap, and the first 
toast drunk to the couple was "Prosperity and posterity." 

Still another wore a gown of Canton crape of peach-blos- 
som tint, trimmed with rows of white lute-string ribbon, 
laid on while the crape was stretched to farthest limit and 
then allowed to crinkle with it wlien the tension was relaxed. 
Pink satin shoes matched the dress, and a wreath of roses 
in her beautiful dark hair and a scarf of finely embroidered 
lawn on her fair neck completed this dainty wedding dress. 
She was wont to tell that when her new father and mother 
came to make the first visit after they began housekeeping, 
they brought the callow pair a large tin pan of ginger-snaps, 
not the wafery specimens of these degenerate days, but great 
golden brown, tootlisome goodies that melted in the mouth 
with delicious richness ; a stately fowl dressed and trussed 
for the oven, and a mighty loaf of rye bread, whose very 
shadow would blot out a battalion of modern bakers' epit- 
omes of loaves. 

It was a pleasant sight to see husbands and wives riding 
to church on the same horse, the wife behind on a pillion, 
from which she was lifted with grave courtesy by her liege 
lord on arriving at the church door. 

It was usual for the elder members to ride in some vehicle 
in winter, bringing the foot-stove for the easily chilled, aged 
feet. Slaves sat in the back corners of the churches, near 



22 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

the door, and their choice Sunday suit was usually a jacket 
of green baize and trousers of linen ticking, striped. 

Shoe-buckles were worn, the finest being made of silver 
and brass, and some set with rhinestones. 

A stuff made of linen and wool, called linseywoolsey, 
striped and plaided and rivalling the peacock in the brilliancy 
of its colors, was much worn. An aged lady declared that 
when she started to church in her first dress of red and green 
linseywoolsey, with the added glory of green velvet collar 
and cuffs, no queen in robes and regalia ever felt prouder. 

Damsels were very exact in polishing the big brass knock- 
er of the front door. A well-kept knocker was considered 
"an outward and visible sign" of the housewifely qualities of 
the marriageable maidens within. 

"Why do you not go to see Blowsalinda any more?" asked 
one rustic beau of another. 

"Too much green pizen on the knocker," was Lubberkin's 
sententious reply. 

Picking wool, hetchelling, carding, spinning, reeling and 
W'Caving went on vigorously. Every damsel had her chest 
of blankets and linen for the time of wifehood. Long webs 
of linen were spread, sprinkled and bleached for days and 
weeks, and laid away in lavender, lemon-balm and rose 
leaves. Many housewives kept one pair of sheets, extra 
long, bleached beyond whiteness and of superfine fineness, 
for the dead, and a web for making shrouds. In the barn 
or garret, boards of red cherry were kept seasoning for the 
last narrow house, and in event of death were carried to the 
undertaker to be made up. No self-respecting landed pro- 
prietor ever allowed himself or family to be laid away in 
"boughten boards." They must come from the forest mon- 
archs of the home acres. Likewise, cradles were made of 
cherry and vi^alnut grown on the little newcomer's paternal 
lands. 



OUR FOREFATHERS 23 

Hold up 3'our heads, ye sylvan lords, 

Wave proudly in the breeze, 
Our cradle-bands and coffin boards 

Must come from forest trees. 

In one family thirty-nine successive babies were rocked in 
one of these venerable hooded black-walnut cradles, every 
one of whom grew tO' man's and woman's estate but one. 
It was called the "good luck" cradle. 

On farms the daughters of the family did the milking. 
It was esteemed a deep disgrace to be seen in the yard after 
sunrise or sunset and the marriageable future of a girl so 
belated in this bucolic employment was deemed sadly marred. 
The pioneer cotton or calico dress of which we have been 
able to get any trace in our valley was worn by Miss Martha 
Wood. It was drab in color, with a pink spot, and cost 
twelve shillings a yard. It was purchased in Newburgh 
and paid for in Orange County butter, made by the owner's 
hands. 

The first piece of fine thin muslin ever seen in Warwick 
was brought there by Mrs. Katy Wood Krafft, of New York 
City. She made some of it into a cap with multitudinous 
frills. Many came to see and examine it. It was noised 
about that it was as inflammable as gunpowder and that in 
sewing on it she was obliged to sit far from the candles, for 
should a spark touch it it would go off in combustion so 
fearful that all the water in the township would be power- 
less before it. Many freely expressed the opinion that they 
would never endanger their lives by putting on their heads 
such a challenge to conflagration. 

At evening and prayer meetings each dame brought a 
candle. The unused ends were given to the very poor. 
These gatherings for worship were invariably announced 
from the pulpit on the Sabbath to take place at "early candle- 
light." Kind neighbors near the churches kept a glowing 
bed of coals on the ample hearth to replenish the foot stoves 
requiring fresh fuel. 



24 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

A discreet boy waited about and made odd pennies, big 
old-fashioned red ones, during service. 

Babies getting restive and weary under the "ninthHes" 
and "tenthHes*' were frequently carried out to a stay-at- 
home-body's, soothed to sleep and reclaimed after service. 
Members of the congregation coming from a distance 
brought luncheon and eating it after the morning service, re- 
mained to attend the afternoon and then returned home. 
Worldly tunes sung to hymns were considered the most 
awful desecration, and a new-fangled tune once caused a 
godly brother to wonder that "the roof did not fall on the 
chorister," blighting himself, tuning-fork and choir forever, 
so fearful was the unrighteous hilarity of the godless air. 

Miss Diademia Austin was a daughter of one of the 
wealthiest citizens of Warwick, and her father presented her 
v>'ith the first piano ever seen in the village. It was called 
a "forte-piano." Rumor stated that the force required to 
extract the music was so severe that the young lady's fingers 
became splayed, "hard as drum-sticks" at the tips and great- 
ly disfigured. 

"Telling the bees" when the head of the household died 
was a common custom. One of the female members of the 
family usually performed this singular office. Arrayed in 
deepest mourning she went sadly forth, tied a piece of crape 
on every hive, and tapping softly, said, "Pretty bees, your 
master is dead, but do not go away." 

Starch was all home-made, usually of potatoes. A large 
tub was filled with thin slices, the contents covered with 
water and allowed to stand a day and a night. The limp 
pieces were then lifted out, the water carefully poured off, 
and the layers of starch on the bottom cut in squares, dried 
and laid away. 

Borrowing fire was the universal practice when, by mis- 
chance or mismanagement, the heart of the hearth ceased to 
glow. The live coals were imbedded in a little hollow of 



OUR FOREFATHERS 25 

ashes, carefully covered with the same and conveyed to tlieir 
destination on a shovel. Housewives who kept fire and 
seldom borrowed could hold their heads above those who 
were frequent pensioners in this friendly interchange of 
benefits, and nothing more expressive need be remarked of 
a careless one than that she was "always running for fire." 
Paterfamilias frequently struck it with a flint — an intensely 
interesting proceeding to the children. 

A warning in rhyme used to be repeated for the benefit of 
all damsels who let the hearth grow chill, and to all swains 
who sought them : 

Kind youth, that seek'st a loving wife 
To be the comfort of your life, 
Beware of her, however fair, 
Or bright of eye, or smooth of hair, 
Whose fire upon the hearth is out; 
She'll surely prove a gadabout, 
And all the children that you sire 
Be raised to run and borrow fire, 
Or you be called in from your work 
To strike the flint for Mistress Shirk. 

Anent tliis custom one of those meaningless little stories 
that belong to all ages and climes is told. 

An old lady had learned all that was to be known, in her 
opinion, set her house in order, and lain down to die. 
"Wherefore should we live," this aged grandam must have 
soliloquized, "when we cannot learn?" Her last act was, 
perhaps from mere force of habit, to carefully cover her fire. 
As she lay waiting for Death's skeleton hand on the latch, 
a gentle rap on the door disturbed her serene meditations. 
Quite a dififerent looking hand sought and raised it to enter, 
and a plump little maid stood revealed, w"ho asked for the 
loan of a few bits of live coal. 

'"But you haven't fetched an}1:hing to carry it in," said 
Gammer. 

"Oh." replied the child, "my hand w'ill do." and she pro- 
ceeded to make a nest of cold ashes in her palm, drop a 



26 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

bright coal therein, top the whole with more ashes, make 
her little "curchey" for the favor, and run home. 

Having learned a lesson from the babe the dame sat up, 
pulled off her nightcap, sprang from the bed and took up her 
duties where she had dropped them, convinced that there is 
always something left to learn. 

A lady used to relate that when a child she was sent for 
fire one afternoon, just before dusk, and returning, saw what 
she supposed to be a large burned stump in the path. Near- 
ing it with the shovel in her hands, it extended two long 
paws and loomed up before her-— a black bear ! Shovel and 
fire flew, and the little girl sped home, whence father and 
brothers were summoned and Bruin was dispatched in a 
hurry. 

This lady had, among her wedding paraphernalia, a rare 
tortoise-shell comb, a Van Dyck collar of rich lace, a pair 
of white satin shoes, and white silk stockings which were 
successively worn by fifteen brides and became a species of 
mascot in the neighborhood of the owner. 

The peregrinating tailoress had an individuality of her 
own, marked and original. Her advent, with the big iron, 
called a "goose," was looked forward to with deep interest 
by the young lads of the household whose garments were 
usually in various stages of dilapidation and repair. The 
goose was always the unprotesting butt of the stale puns 
and quips of the family wits, and the bachelor uncle was 
markedly particular as to the cut, fit and make-up of his 
suit if the tailoress were young, chatty and well-favored. 
Like the shoemaker, she brought breezy bits of gossip, deli- 
cate tidbits of scandal, light and airy as thistledown, and 
as her long, sharp scissors cut and clipped, and her bright 
needle flew through the homespun, gave them evanescent 
airing. 

She was a kindly hearted creature in the main, and while 
Dicky and Tommy watched with dubious eyes the rapidly 



1 



OUR FOREFATHERS 27 

diminishing pieces of blue, sheep's gray and butternut brown 
as grandfather, father, bachelor uncle and elder brother 
were fitted out, she always told them, sotto voce, that if there 
was not enough left of the coveted color for them a suit, she 
would go right up in the night and cut enough off of the 
elders to fit them out. 

A gentleman used to relate, with amusement, that one 
evening, after carrying to his room his new winter suit, just 
finished b}' the tailoress, he was startled to hear a curious 
rumbling outside of the door, and hastening to open it to 
seek the cause, found there a lanky shock-headed "bound 
boy," who had lately become a member of the family, trund- 
ling an immense pumpkin. 

"Say, mister," he whispered in graveyard tones, "I heard 
that thar tailor woman down stairs tell Sammy she was a- 
comin' in your room to-night, after you was asleep, and cut 
a big hunk outen yer new suit to make him one, an' I 
thought I'd come tell yeh and bring this here punkin to 
jam agin yer door to keep her out; fur," he added, in still 
more horror-struck accents, "she said she'd cut off the tails." 

Ensconsed in her work-bag the tailoress- kept a bit of 
salve, which she always brought in case of a burn to her 
hands in the travels of the goose over the seams, and it was 
considered an esteemed privilege by the juveniles to get 
burned on the goose and have an application of the tailoress' 
own particular salve, and then be told by pitying Grandma 
that she "knew a go^jse v/ould bite, but never knew they 
would burn." 

Every now and then a horror in the minds of isolated 
families equal to the massacres of history would occur. The 
sheep would be slaughtered by dogs. The chronicler well 
remembers seeing twenty-one brought in dead one morning, 
mangled in the most fearful manner, every pretty lamb a 
sight to make sluices of all the young eyes in the house. 
Sometimes a sheep was kept for running the churning- 



28 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

machine, usually a pet, fatter and slower than the rest of the 
flock, and came in for an extra amount of worrying. The 
loss of this household favorite was an added calamity, and 
when the word went out that Daisy, Snowball, Whity, or 
whatever this one might be called, was the sorriest sight oi 
all, the sobbing of the youthful tribe was turned into wail- 
ings and lamentations unutterable. 

"Apple-bees" were an annual autumn frolic and looked 
forward to with much pleasure. A small urchin, astride a 
family horse, generally gave out the verbal invitations to the 
merrymaking, and on the appointed evening all gathered at 
the specified place where the kitchen was temporarily trans- 
formed into a huge apple-bin, and the tables groaned with 
tins, pans, trays, etc. After all were pared, cored and sliced, 
some for preserving, some for drying, and a goodly quantity 
for cider "apple-sass" ; when every pretty young head had 
been encircled by an unbroken peeling, swung gently three 
times around, to see what letter it would form when cast 
down, the debris was removed, the floor cleared, and a com- 
fortable supper and dance followed. It was said that Cupid 
put in much fine work at these homespun gatherings, and 
when a couple had a bevy of daughters who lingered long by 
the hearthstone, knowing ones "reckoned they had better 
make a few apple-bees." 

"Trying the fortune," by sticking appleseeds on the upper 
eyelid, was a favorite pastime at apple-bees. Each seed 
was named for a rustic beau, and the Appleseed John hang- 
ing to this precipitous site longest was destined to win the 
fair. Sometimes, too, three or four persistently clung, when 
the damsel was thought to be fated to successive wifehoods 
and widowhoods, A mirth-provoking sight was a bevy of 
pretty girls busily paring apples, and scarcely daring to 
move the head lest the favorite suitor be dislodged and leave 
the field to a rival who verified the old couplet : 



OUR FOREFATHERS 29 

If you want her, don't let her go, 
Stick and you'll get her, whether or no. 

A pathetic little tale of struggle and disappointment used 
to be related by a skillful needlewoman who long assisted 
the housewives of Warwick in which the fleece of the poor 
slain sheep had the leading part. Left an orphan at fifteen, 
with a sister of thirteen and little brother of six, she began 
the struggle of providing for them with her owii industrious 
hands, spinning, sewing and making herself useful in such 
wise, while Betsy cared for the small brother at home. The 
dearest wish of little Jake's heart was that he might have a 
suit of blue clothes with brass buttons, but strive as she 
could, his loving sister could not get the cloth. One day, 
while working at a farmhouse near town, some sheep were 
killed by dogs, and she was given the fleece. Shearing the 
wool herself, she carded, spun and wove it at a friendly 
loom, and dyed it the desircfl blue. It was carefully pressed 
and laid away in a drawer of the cupboard, until such time 
as they could afford to call in the village tailoress, with her 
big shears and goose to assist in fashioning the wonderful 
su;t. 

While Nancy was away a few days after, Betsy, righting 
the big old c ^pboard, opened the drawer to look at the cloth. 

"Phew," she cried with small nose elevated, "it smells 
'sheepy' ; I don't believe Nancy got all the grease out of the 
wool"; and with that she buHf a fire, hung the big brass ket- 
tle on the crane, putting in a goodly quantity of Ive fron": 
the great leach tub by the door, filled it up, threw in the 
cloth, and set it to boil. It bubbled away merrily, and after 
a while the poor little maid, going to give it a g-ood stirring, 
and turn it over in the huge kettle, put in her stick — to find 
nothing there ! Alas ! the biting lye had entirely eaten up 
the soft, fine wool. 

The elder sister used frequently to relate the story and ex- 
press her vexation, and the lamentations of young Jacob 



30 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

may be imagined. Adjusting her cap, as she finished the 
story, she never failed to add : 

"Oh, I could 'a' killed Bets." 

Of all the merrymakings of olden days the "husking 
frolic" was perhaps the gayest. The farmer invited his 
friends and neighbors, who husked all day, and in the even- 
ing the barn was swept and garnished, and heaped-up bas- 
kets of corn were brought in. Soon the girls of the neigh- 
borhood joined the buskers and took part in the work. The 
corn was thrown out in an immense heap in the middle of 
the barn-floor, and every swain chose a fair to sit by his 
side and husk with bin'. Whenever a red ear was found a 
kiss was claimed, amidst much laughter on the part of the 
company, and protesting and battling of the partner. There 
v/as strong suspicion that all the red ears found during the 
day were laid carefully aside to do duty for the evening, and 
there was always much wonder expressed at the amount of 
red ears "this year." After all were finished the merry strains 
of the fiddle began, and blithe was the dancing on the old 
barn-floor, gay was the supper, and sweet the two-by-two 
strolls homeward after all was over, through the delicious 
light of the full moon. 

The husking bee in the old red barn, 
With its mossy sides and sloping eaves, 

Tlie mows of hay that reached the roof, 

The buckwheat brown and the golden sheaves. 

The husking bee in the old red barn. 

When the corn was ripe and the moon was full. 

For rosy lass and willing youth. 
What joy together the husks to pull. 

For each red ear a kiss is claimed, 

But they came not cheap in that merry throng, 

For a redder ear has the ardent swain 

Who fought for his guerdon stout and long. 

In the old red barn, at the rollicking bee, 
'Mid laugh, and shout, and frolic, and jest. 

Oh, never warrior had harder strife — 
To win he must need put forth his best. 



OUR FOREFATHERS 31 

But the dance is done on the old barn-lloor, 
A maid and youth climb the orchard stile. 

He is "seeing her home" ; as he lifts her down, 
Her bright eyes soften, her ripe lips smile. 

Is this the lass who struggled and fought 

Against the kiss of that eager boy, 
Till the corn-husks flew, and the rafters rang 

With screams of mirth at her protest coy? 

Is this the lad with the punished ear, 

That rivalled the reddest in tlie maize, 
With the touch on his of those honey lips. 

That cling as though they would stay there days? 

To the whispered words the nestling birds 

Twitter a sleepy murmur low, 
And the ruddy ear bends down to hear 

Her soft 'T'm sorry I hurt you so." 

The masculine portion of the coniinunity was wont to re- 
joice greatly when a "raising" was on the tapis. It meant 
roast pig, a mighty potpie, with Chanticleer and Dame Part- 
lett snuggling in dismembered savoriness through it, and 
pies and doughnuts, and all good things in such lavish abun- 
dance that no feast was deemed equal to a "raising" supper, 
and one small boy was once heard to exclaim, fervently and 
pufifily, from the depths of his bursting jacket, "I wish we 
could have a new barn every day, I do." 

The "haying frolic" was also a hilarious time of hard 
work and much fun. It always wound up with milk-punch, 
in such generous floods that the land seemed to flow with 
that socjthing cordial for tired muscles. 

Of all the bees of ancient days the one that sends back 
through the ^'ear the most fragrant memory is that of the 
wood gathering for the widows. Of these lonely and bereft 
one<- each hamlet possessed full quota. They did not dwell 
in affluence, i)Oor souls, not many of them, and when Old 
Boreas came down from the "North Countrie" and sleighing 
was good, kind neighbors hauled out the wood-sleds, made 
long the stakes that held the loads up at the sides, and those 
who owned wood-lets in mountain and valley gave good 



32 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

measure to the widows. These were hauled by the busy 
"bees" and deposited at each humble door, and many a 
frugal heait was made to sing for joy as it felt the hearth- j 
stone glow through the bitter winter with the generous gift. 

On one occasion an aged citizen gave a $5 gold piece with 
every load. Another, a kindly miller, each fall gave a bag 
of wheaten flour and a bag of meal to every widow in the 
vicinity. This custom was continued up to the time of his 
death. 

One landed proprietor was wont, as he sat before his 
blazing hearth, to muse on the prospects of his descendants 
for fuel and grieve for fear the wood might be exhausted 
and future want exist. Sometimes the good old man, al- 
thougli owning broad acres of timber, would remove an 
extra brand, saying, "We must be very careful ; I don't know 
what our children will do for wood, it's going so fast." 

Tlie provident settlers had never heard of coal, electricity 
and other substitutes for the back-log and fore-stick and all 
that glowed in their embrace. 

Among the most unique of these helpful neighborly gath- 
erings was the "boonder frolic." Milk and cream were kept 
in shallow keeler tubs. These required a vast amount of 
scrubbing to keep them clean and sweet, and were frequent- ' 
ly scalded with boiling whey and hay tea. The modern 1 
brush was unknown, so sticks of white ash were cut andl| 
sawed into proper lengths, friends and neighbors gathered,, 
each bringing a knife and the tough, supple wood was;! 
shaved up three-fourths of its length and turned back intq 
a brush, very useful and lasting. No dancing or supper 
was allowed until each had completed one. When all was 
done, the evening's merr3^making commenced. 

The beau who finished the first boonder was entitled to 
as many kisses from the assembled gathering of pretty girls 
as he could steal. It is said his head sometimes developed 
bumps unknown to Gall and Spurzheim, inflicted by the 



I OUR FOREFATHERS 33 

handy boonders in defence of cheeks and Hps, and that fre- 
quently a black eye was added. 

A gentleman, whose home was at the foot of the moun- 
tain, saw sixty of these brushes turned out in one night at 
a -"bee." 

A hank of boonder cord was spun of tow each year in 
many families. On the mountain-side tenants resided, who 
gave to the owners of the land "board-load," after the old 
English custom ; that is, the timber each tenant made agree- 
ment to carry yearly to the owner. Among this quantity 
was usually specified so much for keeler tubs, boonders, 
fagots, oven-wood and ax handles, each of proper variety 
for its use. Loads of firewood were also comprehended in 
this "board-load." 

Very large flocks of geese were kept by many farmers, 
and the feather bees were the only ones from which the 
masculine element were excluded. They seem to have been 
the first hen parties of early days. 

When Goodman Jones, Smith or Brown found the borders 
of pond and meadow lands blossoming with feathers dropped 
from the overweighted birds, they were pronounced fit for 
picking. Large flocks were kept, usually numbering from 
ten to sixty, and as it was impossible for the owners to de- 
nude so many of their downy raiment, neighboring wives 
and daughters were invited to help. Each brought a linen 
pillow slip to cover the head and protect the hair from the 
flying down, and a long woolen stocking to draw over the 
heads of refractory and protesting geese and ganders to keep 
them from squawking and biting during the picking process. 
A paddle was also kept to spank the too unruly ones and it 
was said tO be most effectual, — a thorough good spanking 
cooling down and rendering submissive the most clamorous 
matron goose and the most lordlv and belligerent of the an- 
cient ganders. Jl was a standing joke at feather bees to call 
on the mother of many olive branches to come from one to 



34 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

another and paddle an unruly goose or gander, as she "had 
her hand in." 

It was considered a sad breach of etiquette for the maker 
of the bee to appear at all solicitous or anxious about the 
feathers carelessly dropped or blown about and expressive 
of penuriousness in a matron it would sometimes be said, 
"Why, she would chase a feather half a mile." 

The youngest girl at the gathering who plucked the most 
geese was entitled to enough down to sew herself a down 
tippet for her fair neck. 

An aged farmer declared that the large flocks kept were 
most destructive to farms, and that though the wives and 
daughters pleaded for them, both for the pocket money and 
the nice pillows and beds, such was the destruction of lawns 
and pasture lands, hay crops and watering places by these 
birds, that they were at length utterly banished from almost 
every estate. 

The advent of young claimants for name and place in the 
family circle was usually an occasion of hilarity and rejoic- 
ing. Baby was up for general inspection and comment to 
numerous callers from its first day. Mother and child were 
not zealously guarded as now by an Argus-eyed nurse from 
sight and sound. Very frequently they were subjected to 
hurtful company and mirth. One young mother was once 
nearly killed by a bevy of the youthful father's bachelor 
friends, who called and threw her into fits of hysterical laugh- 
ter with their pranks and jokes, until she barely escaped ut- 
ter prostration. Babies, old and young, were carried to 
church and it was no uncommon sight to see a dozen or 
more distressed mammas dandling uneasy infants through 
an entire service. 

It is told of a resident of honor and repute that, a pre- 
cocious three-year-old, in his mother's arms in church one 
Sabbath, he espied a dog greatly resembling a pet one of his 
own at home trotting placidly up the aisle. Rev. Zelotus 



OUR FOREFATHERS 35 

Grennell was the ofificiating clergyman and a warm friend 
of the family. Clapping his hands in high glee, he cried 
out shrilly, "Sick 'im. Pike ; sick Mr. Gren, I say, and bite 
his nose off," causing that worthy divine to suddenly pause 
in his sermon, a grave deacon near to clasp his sides, and 
hold them firmly to keep them from undue expansion, and 
the younger members of the congregation to giggle audibly. 

During the War of 1812 there was not a dish to be pur- 
chased in Warwick village, and many good housewives 
found their meager supply numing low or entirely gone. 
Not even the common delft, with its oddly grotesque buff 
and indigo-hued figures, could be procured. A bed of blue 
clay was opened on a farm in the suburbs and tableware 
made therefrom. One good wife was quite an adept in 
moulding and firing these home-made substitutes for dishes 
and not only shaped and baked them for herself, but for 
neighbors and the village folk, assisting one bride to an out- 
fit of this impromptu table furnishing who was so heroic as 
to wed and set up housekeeping in the straitened war times. 
She was accustomed to relate that she at last broke her tea- 
pot, and tried days to make one, but could never fashion 
handle and spout securely. 

Frequently little boys dug clay from this bed and moulded 
marbles, snakes and rude symbols therefrom, and besought 
mother to hurry the baking from the big brick oven in the 
chimney corner that they might tumble in their clay handi- 
work. 

When the thrilling play of "Injun" filled all space with 
whoops and wild alarm, the war-paint was invariably this 
blue clay mixed with water. When alternated with stripes 
I and markings of yellow clay, also found in abundance, the 
youthful savages on the war-path were sufficiently diabolical 
in appearance to strike thrills of terror into the hearts of the 
little girl-mothers, shielding herds of children in forts and 
block-houses formed of porches, empty rain hogsheads, 



36 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

smokehouses and wood-piles. This yellow clay is of coarser 
grain than the blue, and was not used for moulding. In pre- 
paring the blue for dish-making, it was softened with lin- 
seed oil, and given, just before baking, numerous brushings 
with boiling sweet milk. 

Thorns were the only resource for hairpins our grand- 
mothers knew, and the sharpest, smoothest and finest were 
gathered at a certain stage and preserved for use. 

The legions of complexion restorers were unknown in 
early days, though the fair were not utterly unmindful of the 
beautifying arts. The suet of lambs was simmered with 
scarlet, honey-filled blossoms of the red balm, making a sim- 
ple, soothing lip salve. The blood beet formed an innocent 
rouge for pale lips and cheeks, and face powder was bolted 
from the hom_e-made starch. The pomatum softening and 
making lustrous the smoothly worn bands and braids of 
hair was invariably of beef's marrow, perfumed with ber- 
gamot from the garden beds. Tansy, infused in buttermilk, 
was the favorite cosmetic for tan and freckles. When, in 
the spring, the family lard-tub gave out, there was found in 
the bottom a small quantity of fine lard oil. Rose leaves 
were simmered in this and it was used as an unguent for the 
face. An aged lady of Brooklyn declares her own grand- 
mother used to carefully gather this fine oil from the lard- 
tub, mix it with rosewater and use it as a wrinkle banisher. 
This custom evidently came from the country cousin. 

Sports and pastimes now wholly unknown brought to- 
gether crowds in days of old. The butting contests of ne- 
groes was one. A gentleman who well remembered these 
said he had attended them on the borders of what was then 
called Wickham's Pond. Many of the participators were 
ex-slaves of old families. These would congregate and butt 
each other with force and fury wonderful to behold, like 
veritable Inimnn battering rams, tumbling and rolling in the 
soil after the collision with shouts and guffaws of wild, hila- 



OUR FOREFATHERS 37 

rious laughter, white teeth gleaming, wool standing out like 
a bushnian's and perspiration streaming down the shining 
black faces. The hardest head knocked out all the rest, and 
was the champion of the bout. This uncouth sport drew 
numbers of the citizens of the village and vicinity. 

A decidedly uniciue amusement often occupied winter 
evenings, particularly at the country inns. Rye bread was 
moulded into a ball with from three to five prongs by some 
housewife's hands. Many landladies became adepts in mak- 
ing these, and they were dubbed "dough babies." The boys 
and men hurled these against the wall, endeavoring to break 
ofl: one or more of the prongs. So compactly and cunningly 
were they moulded that this was almost an impossibility. 

One of these contests once took place in a hotel at Bell- 
vale. About a dozen men were taking part in it, when a 
teamster drove in the yard and stopped for the night. On 
entering he was, for a time, a silent witness of the trials at 
throwing the dough balls. At length he offered to take part, 
and becoming excited after several unsuccessful efforts finally 
bet quite heavily that he could "break a leg off the dough 
baby." He hurled it, and one fell. It was picked up, and 
the marks of thumb and finger nails plainly showed a reason 
for the break. So great was the indignation of the party that 
the host could not prevent his guests from summarily eject- 
ing the culprit and ducking him into the cooling waters of 
the creek. These bouts seemed peculiarly exciting, for one 
at the old Stone Hotel, in Warwick, once ended in a free 
fight, bloody noses and cracked heads. 

Pitching quoits was a favorite village pastime. A spot 
long used for this game was in front of the Ward Hotel. 
There it was played at one time almost incessantly. 

A bustling and thrifty housewife of the town, with a 
spouse much in love with the sport, requested him to dig 
a lettuce bed one balmy spring morning. Looking out, after 
a while, she espied the shovel bolt upright in the earth, and 



38 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

the hand that should have held it gone ; it was easy to con- 
jecture where. In a moment she too had disappeared and 
the recreant was led from the alluring quoit ground, and 
was shortly thereafter observed digging away for dear life 
in the lettuce bed, with one very warm-hued ear. 

Fencing was common, and much practised, the old Stone 
Hotel being the scene of frequent contests with sword and 
foil, and many young men evinced much skill in this art. 

Pigeons were very plentiful in the early days of the town. 
Sometimes the air seemed almost darkened with the im- 
mense flocks of these birds. A farmer living near the vil- 
lage one morning bagged ninety-six in a short time in the 
woods. They had settled so thickly on the trees and bushes 
that he clubbed many down, wrung the necks of some, and 
every shot brought down numbers. Savory potpies, stews, 
broils and genuine pigeon-pies, in which the birds predom- 
inated over the crust, were plentiful in the humblest homes. 

A little four-year-old on hearing the wails of a newly ar- 
rived brother inquired anxiously what was the matter of the 
stranger. 

"I guess he must be hungry," ventured grandma. 

"Then why don't you give him some pigeon with 'thoup' 
on it." she cried, in a burst of prodigality ; "our cellar is 
full of em." 

Gleaning the fields, that most ancient custom, was not 
unknown to our valley and a lady loved to tell how, having 
been given permission to glean wheat, she once gathered 
enough to buy her a dress with the proceeds. This aged 
Ruth delighted to narrate with what care she selected the 
finest and heaviest heads from the stubbly field, and neatly 
laid stalk by stalk, until sheaves as large as she could man- 
age were gathered and borne home in triumph at night. 
Well and hardly earned, we should say, was this new gown. 

It was a very common sight to see young ladies going 
through the streets carrying small linen wheels in their arms 



OUR FOREFATHERS 39 

to a "spinning frolic." The disappearance of fields of flax, 
with its exquisite hlue flower, from our landscape is much 
to be regretted. 

The annual soap-making was an event of deep interest in 
the family circle, and when it would not "make," or come, 
in household parlance, heavy was the woe of the housewife. 

No doubt many a head now gray will recall the cheese- 
making, that time delectable to childhood. The warm, frag- 
rant milk poured into the tubs where it slowly solidified in 
snowy whiteness, the cutting and breaking of the masses of 
curds for the huge creaking press, and the delicious squares 
doled out on the way to the old screw where it was mould- 
ed were episodes to remain long in memory. 

Painful were the lives of those of artistic tastes. Not one 
avenue for the exercising of these tendencies opened to 
them. One lady, with an inborn love of art, painted all her 
pictures with colors expressed from field and garden flowers. 
Another made a landscape, quite a creditable picture, entirely 
formed of the scrapings of linen and wool. The effect was 
soft and mossy, and really very pretty, splotches of red and 
brown giving an effective autumnal tint to the foliage and 
foreground. 

The kitchen hearth was the shrine upon which were often 
immolated the complexions of mistress and maids. Here 
the meals were prepared, with an infinity of detail now al- 
most unknown, and here, in a huge kettle depending from 
the crane, swung out for the monotonous duty, with eyes 
and brow searing in the glowing heat, the bound or slave- 
girl washed the dishes. 

In a home near the village a unique dish-kettle was in use 
for many years. The master of the house, enjoined by his 
spouse to replace the one lately broken, brought her, in a 
spirit of fun, an Indian mortar which he found in the woods. 
Given a place by the hearthstone the family delft and china 
were cleansed in it for years. Later it did duty by the an- 



40 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

cient well-curb as catch-basin for overfull pail drippings, as 
a stopping-place for thirsty wild-birds, and anchorage for 
many fleets of walnut and acorn boats. The dark-browed 
Indian wife crouched above it, pounding the yellow maize 
for her saturnine lord and little ones, probably never 
dreamed that her primitive kitchen utensil would serve also 
in the wigwam of the paleface conqueror. 

A comical bit from the curriculum of early school days 
used to be related by a venerable lady who participated in 
the exercise. Saturday was never a holiday, and on that 
afternoon each week all small maidens over ten were re- 
quired to come with an extra clean pinafore and hair of un- 
rumpled smoothness to be instructed in "The Whole Duty 
of Woman." Each girl took her place in line, small calf- 
skins rigidly toeing a crack in the floor, and with hands 
meekly folded listened while the master read from Holy ] 
Writ such selections as conduce to duty and obedience in 
God-fearing women. Then the little damsels repeated these 
and kindred lines until committed to memory: 

Ye daughters of the land attend 
To what I say and comprehend. 

The Lord, who doeth all things well, 
Hath put you here, as He doth tell. 

For one set purpose, clear and true, 
And see that His commands you do. 

Be a good daughter, mother, wife, 
Strict in your house your mortal life. 

Learn to preserve, to cure, to bake, 
And fill the larder for man's sake; 

So will he comfort find in home 
And never from his doorstone roam. 

Then when in death you close your eyes, 
In the blest hope some day to rise. 

Remember this will crown your life, 
A daughter, mother, friend, and wife; 



OUR FOREFATHERS 41 

Ever homekeeping, busy, true, 

Your stone can say no more of you. 

The subjoined was a favorite poem frequently read by 

the teacher to the row of httle maids, and who shall say it 

does not contain pure nuggets of sound counsel? 

Detest disguise, remember 'tis your part 

By gentle fondness to retain the heart. 

Let duty, prudence, virtue take the lead 

To fix your choice and from it ne'er recede ; 

Abhor coquetry, spurn the shallow fool 

Who measures out stale compliments by rule. 

And without meaning, like the chattering jay, 

Repeats the same dull strain from day to day. 

Are men of sense attracted by your face, 

Your well-turned figure, or their compound grace. 

Be mild and equal, moderately gay. 

Your judgment, rather than your wit, display; 

By aiming at good breeding, strive to please, 

'Tis nothing more than regulated ease. 

Does one dear youth among a worthy train 

The best affections of your heart obtain, 

And is he reckoned worthy of your choice. 

Is your opinion with the general voice? 

Confess it then, nor from him seek to hide 

What's known to every person else beside; 

Attach him to you in a generous mind, 

A lively gratitude expect to find, 

Receive his vows, and by a kind return 

Affection's blaze will e'er the brighter burn. 

Disdain duplicity, from pride be free, 

What every woman should you then will be. 

This was a selected poem by an old author, and did ser- 
vice in "The Whole Duty of Woman" with admirable effect. 
The time-stained copy from which this is transcribed is 
94 years old. Daughters of to-day may marvel that all the 
teaching of that day was for forming the minds of wives, 
but, my dears, the bachelor girl had not then been heard of. 

The little girl who participated in this unique instruction, 
and told it, a venerable raconteur, never ventured her barque 
on the sea of matrimony. She lived until her years num- 
bered eighty-three, and ever recalled the snickers, grins and 
complacent glances of the "big boys" as the candidates for 
knowledge on "The Whole Duty of Woman" stood up with 
military precision and were taught therein. 



42 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

Man held almost exclusive dominion in the schoolroom 
in early times, but one little woman — for she was very small, 
indeed — has left a memory there which should be enshrined 
in all loyal hearts. She was a faithful teacher, a patriot of 
the truest type and a wife — well ! such a wife as man may 
search long for and find but seldom. She loved, honored 
and devotedly cared for as poor a specimen of a bread-win- 
ner as need fall to w^oman's lot, but he was canonized in her 
eyes, as you shall see. 

Jamsie Strader went to the war, the old conflict of 1812, 
and though never brave nor given to conscientious per- 
formance of duty in any every-day walk of life, there covered 
himself with glory. This man, naturally timid, ever shift- 
less, did, in three consecutive battles, fight like a very belted 
knight, was severely wounded in the fourth, and sent home, 
where, suffering from chronic stiffness and lameness, he 
was retired, given a pension, and nevermore lifted a finger 
in work throughout his mortal life. But little Rhoda Strad- 
er sat store by her incongruous lord, and thought only of 
the heroism of her warrior, for true patriotism swallows up 
every other earthly consideration in a loyal heart, and this 
is as it should be. Her Jamsie had fought for his country, 
shed his blood, and nearly died ; been made a corporal for 
bravery, and it was enough for this noble, liberty loving soul 
— she asked no more. Why should her Joshua not rest in 
peace at his own fireside now? Wars were over, he had 
fought bravely and well, and song and story all declared it 
should be thus. 

Rhoda always averred that no more timid man than Jamsie 
ever breathed. When Kissy, the spirited little family mare, 
ran away and nearly dumped them off the bridge in the 
brook, she said Jamsie's very ears took on a ghostly pallor, 
and that they were only saved by her grasping the lines and 
"sawing" Kissy into obedience. She often said he would 
demur at taking a hen ofif the nest if she were a known 



OUR FOREFATHERS 43 

"picker," but when he went to war — here her eyes would 
kindle — "he fought like a wildcat every battle, pressed on to 
the thickest of the fray, and never tlinched until he was shot 
down and carried to the rear streaming with blood and 
shouting for 'one more chance at 'em.' " That a man nat- 
urally so fearsome should have broken out into such valor 
was an enigma her mind failed to solve, but she glorified 
him for it, and he drew his pension and took his rest after 
"battles past," while Rhoda taught and sewed and eked out 
their slender living with untiring patience and industry. 

The patriotic fervor of this little woman, whose heart, to 
fall into hyperbole, was about three times as big as her body, 
words are poor to express. Rhoda Strader had a gift. She 
could illustrate c[uite graphically. The old wooden black- 
board in her schoolroom frequently bore evidence of her 
talent, and she loved, after lessons were over, to picture 
thereon stirring scenes of battle, of triumph and defeat. 
Rest assured the brave American forces were always ram- 
pant, the foe wounded, fleeing or stark and stiff in seas of 
gritty white chalk gore. Would that Dame Rhoda could 
have had a box of the many-colored crayons of our day. 
How she would have delineated ensanguined conflicts and 
brought out her red and blue forces ! Still, with native tal- 
ent and a bit of chalk to set the teeth on edge, her work 
shone grandly in silver-headed veterans, in General Wash- 
ington's white war-horse in snowy plumes and gauntlets, 
and the icy wastes of Valley Forge. It must have been a 
poor fancy that could not imagine all the colors wanted when 
Redcoats fell before the Blue, and life-blood stained the 
sod while Rhoda told the "oft-told tale." 

The Fourth of July was a great day for the rural school. 
Then, indeed, did this tiny patriot fairly bubble and boil 
over with quenchless enthusiasm and loyal fervor. She 
would marshal her boys on the green stretcli of worn grass 
in front of the schoolhouse, and spend the day in a genuine 



44 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

celebration. Joyfully she sang with them such soul-thrilling 
songs as these, in which she had trained them well : 

All hail this festal day 

Let every heart be stirred, 
When Freedom, with a clarion voice. 

Sent forth the joyful word ; 
And British minions left the soil 
To conquering freemen's honest toil 

Death to the tyrant, 

Wherever he be, 
Who would set his base heel 

On the land of the free — 

and other martial melodies; had them speak "pieces," brist- 
ling with rancor against foreign invaders, go through sham 
battles, march ; in fact, the day was made an ovation to the 
wooden American eagle with a green tail over the school- 
room door. In the battle exercise Dame Rhoda displayed 
that true womanly trait which ever seeks to make the best of 
circumstances. For the coming fray she always selected the 
strongest and heartiest boys for the American force, while 
the timorous and weak ones were relegated to the British 
side. When the battle opened the Redcoats were in the 
twinkling of an eye routed horse and foot, were even known 
to flee in wild disorder, their generals and captains panic- 
stricken, while the valorous Yankee troops held the field 
and jeered and hooted the retreating horde. After the ex- 
ercises were duly finished, the conflict over and victory 
perched on our banners. Dame Rhoda had the wounded 
cared for, the fleeing returned, order restored and wound 
up with a speech, exhorting them with fervid earnestness 
to love their country, prize its liberties, hold fast to the 
Declaration of Independence, and shed the last drop of their 
blood in defence of its great principles. With tears in her 
bright eyes she would recount over ^nd again how the col- 
onists marched shoeless and with bleeding feet, hungry and 
scantily clothed, with never a word of complaint, ready 



OUR FOREFATHERS 45 

through all their suffering to spring to the call of duty, and 
exhort and inspire her boys to ever do the same in defence 
of liberty. 

As has been told, Dame Rhoda's husband, made a cor- 
poral for bravery and devotion to duty, and retired on a 
pension, had rested on his laurels, and was but little heard 
of in their small world. But on this great day Corporal 
Jamsie came to the front as he did in the time of conflict, 
and was to the fore, and a man of note. Donning his "sojer 
clothes," he fired his treasured musket a great many times, 
led the march — in which his limp brought the crimson of 
pride to Rhoda's cheeks — sang lustily, and also harangued 
the boys to loyalty and the girls to give their hearts to a 
soldier, the only man worth a woman's love and pride. Oh, 
how Rhoda's eyes sparkled when Jamsie said this ! How it 
found an echo in her loyal, loving heart! Then the day 
would end with a bag of seed-cakes, a glass of metheglin, 
and a long four-stranded braided stick of molasses candy for 
each pupil. How her face shone as she saw her hero come 
out strong on this glorious occasion ! It was the only one 
in which Jamsie was known to come out at all, but it was 
sufficient. That fond, patriotic heart was content. The inci- 
dents of this sketch of Rhoda's life were given by one of her 
own pupils, who lived to a great age, and who never ceased 
to recall with amusement and pride her loyal little teacher. 

"The days of long ago!" — the poet's, the historian's, the 
antiquarian's theme! Will these in which we live transmit 
to our descendants such cherished memories? Fold by fold 
falls the veil of years, hiding darkly and still more densely 
all that marked them. Year by year the withered lips are 
sealed that could tell so much, and in closing these pages, let 
the wish be expressed that all coming in contact with these 
precious old friends will gather and garner every priceless 
reminiscence — for they may not hear them again. 



i 



Ill 



Wooings and Weddings of 
Ye Olden Time 



Ill 

Wooings and Weddings of 
Ye Olden Time 



^^^^^^-'^^AS there any romance in the. days of tallow- 
WT" ^^^P^' petticoats and short-gowns, sanded floors 
{and sparsely settled hamlets? If any doubt 
'it, let them read this sincerely faithful record 
jof hearts now dust that lived, beat and loved, 
as the great muscular viscus has had a habit of doing 
through the ages, and, it is confidently asserted, will keep 
right on doing, for when did not the "sons of God see the 
daughters of men that they were fair?" 

Now, once upon a time, two snug farms spread their green 
lengths over the countryside, some miles apart, and on one 
dwelt a widow with an only son and on the other a widower 
and only daughter. The young folk met at apple-bees, at 
quiltings, at dances and merrymakings, and it fell out that 
soon one of the widow's best horses was every Sunday night 
to be seen wending its way toward the widower's home, 
where, before the front gate, it rubbed its nose against the 
tie-post, pawed and fretted, and looked vainly for feet that 
were very slow in coming. History, which is not the less to 
be trusted because it is handed down through truthful, honest 
lips, declares that this went on for four years, and these 
lovers were no nearer the consummation of their hopes than 
at the beginning. 

For how could the widow do without that only son ? Are 
they not the apples of their mothers' eyes when they are 
good and wholesome fruit? And what could that lone 



so UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

widower do without that dear child, who kept his home, 
carded, spun and wove, knitted his comfortable stockings, 
made the small wheel whir as she spun the family linen, 
and when it was all done, was, no doubt, a pretty picture as 
she flew in and out, sprinkling- the web that whitened on the 
bleach-yard grass? 

As it is a vexatious thing to have no name for a hero and 
heroine, we will call these two John and Huldah, which was 
not their names at all ; indeed^ so charming was their story 
that this chronicler was minded to give them in full, but a 
cautious friend whispers, "Maybe their descendants" (who 
still dwell in great peace, plenty and honor in their native 
valley) "might not like it," and if there is aught on this 
earth a stumbling-block in the way of a little gossip over 
love and romance, it is a pestiferously prudent and cautious 
friend. Like it, indeed ! ! They should be proud of it and 
keep their pretty story framed in the best room in all their 
homes. 

The fourth winter crept on. Cold were the nights and 
deep the snow, still patient Dobbin went the old accustomed 
journey every Sunday eve, and still the wedding problem 
was worse of solution to these fond lovers than the Differen- 
tial Calculus, of which abhorrent thing they had never heard. 
One bitter night John stayed late, very, very late, in fact, 
and was thoroughly scolded by his mother next morning, 
who wound up by declaring, just as mothers do now, that 
"Really, it is a shame to keep a poor girl up so," seemingly 
oblivious to the fact that they once made no protest against 
a like infliction. But, dear, kind souls ! they are always more 
tender of their children than of themselves, and particularly 
anxious over their daughters-to-be. 

John did not wait for Sunday night nor the cover of dark- 
ness for his next call. He stopped on his way to the village 
the very coming Tuesday ? When he left, there were tears 
and fire in Huldah's brown eyes. They were brown, and so 



WOOINGS AND WEDDINGwS 51 

are some of her I-don't-know-how-many-greats-granddaug'h- 
ters' to-day, brown, and bright, and sometimes fiery, too. 
That wintry night the one cow not dry was milked, the hen- 
house carefully stopped up to keep the inmates' combs from 
freezing, pigs fed and chores done, and Huldah had supper 
ready, and as white and light a shortcake baking in the tin 
oven (the old Dutch oven before the fire) as her plump 
brown hands ever kneaded. Now, if paterfamilias had one 
pet weakness, it was for a nice hot shortcake, and here, I am 
glad I have concealed Huldah's true name from her descend- 
ants, forsooth to say, with the making of that shortcake — 
which was eaten with raspberry jam — Huldah set out on an 
awful course of intrigue and cunning that should have made 
every mother's son and daughter born of her a diplomat, 
only none of them ever were. To show further her "dex- 
terity and skill in securing advantages," which is Webster 
for diplomacy, this artful girl had a pitcher of cider flip all 
ready when the good father entered, and divesting himself 
of his outer garments, proceeded to comfort his inner man. 
The room was bright with sparkling fire and tallow candles, 
Huldah charming in a self-woven flannel dress, dyed a lovely 
butternut brown by her own deft hands, and as the sole head 
of the little home drew up his easy chair before the fire and 
watched the snow thaw from his boots before the ruddy 
blaze, it is not to be doubted that he felt very thankful that 
when men began to multiply on the face of the earth, daugh- 
ters were born unto them. Then Huldah, in whose once 
guileless heart a design deep and momentous v/as now darkly 
brewing, once more inserted the poker in the flip till it 
hissed, and pouring out a bowlful said : "You were so long 
in stopping up the hen-house to-night, father, I thought I'd 
have this ready for you," and while he sipped, she placed the 
shortcake and fragrant hot tea on the board, and they ate, 
drank and were merry, as a kind father and a loving daugh- 
ter should be. And while that delicious shortcake was disap- 



52 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

pearing, she said in the most offhand and innocent way, 
■'Father, John's mother is going to have a httle company Sat- 
urday, and she wants you and me to come." It is not known 
whether the expletive "Bosh!" was used in those primitive 
times (that miserable monosyllable that has crushed the 
hopes of femininity so ruthlessly in these latter days), but 
Huldah told her children, and they told theirs right on down 
until it came straight to me, that, in spite of the flip and 
shortcake, that ungrateful father said he wouldn't "go one 
step" ; that he didn't "know the widder overly and didn't 
want to." 

Oh ! the perversity, ingratitude and obstinacy of man's 
insensate heart. Had not lovely women been given, by an 
all-merciful Providence, just such powers of cajoling, plead- 
ing, winning, as Huldah exercised that night, well, there 
would never have been this story to write, that's all. Certain 
it is that the supper dishes stood unwashed and the grand- 
father's clock in the corner pointed to nine before Huldah 
won her way, and that obdurate father's consent to go to the 
widow's. But, let it be a crown of glory to her memory, she 
did win, and they went. 

It was a good old-fashioned dinner, with roast chicken 
and pumpkin and mince pies, we are sure, but that these 
were in the actual bill of fare is not known. What follows 
is : When the dinner was done, all gathered in the snug front 
room about the bright brass andirons that held the crackling 
fire. Huldah and her father were the only guests. In war, 
in love, in family matters, deep and intricate, decisive action 
is ever found to be the most effectual. And so pretty Huldah, 
putting her hand in John's, said, "Father, John and I have 
decided to get married," and John, holding fast to that faith- 
ful little hand, echoed, "Yes, mother, that's so." 

"But you can't, you shan't ; not now. What shall we do ?" 
cried mother and father in a breath, feeling that the uni- 
verse was shaking around them in this cataclysm. "We have 



WOOINGS AND WEDDINGS 53 

no objection, only we can't live alone in our lonesome 
homes," they wailed in chorus. 

"Nor need you, father," said this wise and managing 
daughter. "We have it all arranged. You take mother 
home with you, and I'll come here with JoJm, and we will all 
be just as snug as can be." 

And before the spring thaws swelled the streams there 
were two weddings, the widow and Huldah exchanged 
homes, and it is believed that not one of the family was so 
rejoiced over this turn in affairs as Dobbin, who no doubt 
indulged in a quiet horse-laugh of intense delight when he 
found his melancholy vigils at the widower's tie-post were 
forever ended. The dual unions proved most happy, and 
were felicitous in the extreme for the numerous grandchil- 
dren, who emulated the example set them by their worthy 
parents, and wedded happily just as fast as they grew up, 
and all have shown a particular aversion to long courtships. 
We cannot forbear, in ending this little record of an old- 
time wooing, to finish their modest history with these truly 
appropriate words: 

Year after year, 'neath sun and storm, 

Their hopes in Heaven, their trust in God, 

In changeless, heartfelt, holy love, 

These two the world's rough pathway trod. 

Age might impair their youthful iires, 

Their strength might fail, 'mid life's bleak weather, 

Still hand in hand they journeyed on; 
Kind souls, they slumber now together. 

One very dull and rainy autumn evening early in the last 
century, just as the settled gloom of night closed in, there 
came a rap at the door of the Rev. Thomas Montanye, who 
resided in an old stone house on the edge of the village. A 
trim town maiden, who had been assisting in the family, 
opened the door, and found there a worthy colporteur from 
the Literary Rooms of Eastburn, Kirk & Co., Wall and Nas- 
sau streets. New York, who was straightwav made welcome, 



54 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

dried, warmed and fed, and given a seat by the hospitable 
fireside. Finally the family retired, leaving the guest still 
at the chimney lug and the damsel on household cares intent, 
preparatory to closing for the night. The worth}- clergyman 
was sweetly sleeping the sleep of the just vvhen, in timid and 
anxious tones, the voice of his handmaiden roused him from 
slumber, and he was informed that somebody wished to see 
him. Thinking it was some poor soul seeking spiritual con- 
solation, or some messenger from a bed of death in pursuit 
of his ministrations, he hastily rose, dressed, went forth, and 
was confronted by his guest. Taking the maiden by the 
hand, he informed the host that it was their wish and inten- 
tion to be married on the spot. After carefully examining 
into his references, it was found that the would-be groom 
seemed worthy and of good report, the damsel willing and 
ready, and the ceremony was then and there performed. 

This was the shortest wooing that the history of Warwick 
hands down, having lasted from about nine until one o'clock. 
The mind dwells with pleasing reflections on this speedy 
courtship. No time for those awful shoals and quicksands, 
lovers' quarrels, no "partings, such as press the life from 
out young hearts," no weary fashioning of wedding gar- 
ments, nor anxious planning of divers cakes, nor backbreak- 
ing garnishing of company rooms. This precipitate pair 
dwelt in love and great peace until death did them part, but 
left no descendants in- the town, and a stranger hand records 
their hasty wooing and its almost forgotten romance. 

Among the graves in the old village churchyard was a 
lonely mound, over which no stone, however humble, was 
ever set, and when the relics of its silent tenants were gath- 
ered together and placed in the beautiful new cemetery, if 
aught remained in that unmarked tomb, it was deposited 
among the unidentified dead. She, whose dust reposed there, 
was once a brown-haired, merry girl, of unusual grace and 
charm, belonging to an old race now extinct in the valley. 



WOOINGS AND WEDDINGS 55 

Two daughters were born to this family, and the younger 
is the subjeet of this sketcii. The elder sister was a severe 
and gloomy person, ascetic and Puritanical, and years older 
than the younger, whose gay and volatile spirits she often 
chided and endeavored to repress. In time an admirer of 
the youthful girl appeared upon the scene, who won no favor 
with parents or exact sister, and who was at length forbidden 
the house. The pretty girl was petulant and wilful, resented 
the banishment of her lover, and declared, in rebellious grief, 
her intention to be loyal to him. 

Anon, there were stolen meetings, the vigilance of parents 
and sister was eluded, until alas ! alas ! one clay the lover was 
gone, a terrible revelation came to the secluded farmhouse, 
and in time the blighted girl held an infant to her desolate 
bosom, doomed never to know a father's love or protection. 
Then, grievous to record, there commenced on the elder 
sister's part a course of resentment and systematic oppres- 
sion toward the hapless young creature, pitiful to relate. 
She succeeded in turning the parents' hearts more and more 
bitterly against her, she was literally banished from human 
ken, condemned to the meanest drudgery of the home, and 
reproach and indignity heaped upon her defenceless head. 
The old church, where once her bright face and sweet voice 
were found, knew her no more, guests at the home saw only 
her vacant place at table and in the family circle ; and 
clamped mouths and cold, forbidding glances met any inquiry 
after her. Her pastor was deeply concerned in regard to 
these sad rumors of the girl, who, from a little child in the 
Sabbath-school in the old church, still pointing its spire to the 
zenith, he had loved and taught, and once made bold to call 
at the house and ask for her. Laying his hand kindly on 
the father's shoulder, he said, "My brother, where is my 
little Jane?" White, and shaking with rage, the stern, 
wounded old parishioner replied, "Dead, dead, dead, she died 
five months ago." The kind-hearted man of God, baffled and 



56 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

aggrieved, took his leave, and ventured no more to see the 
child so dear, so tenderly pitied by his truly Christian heart. 

But in the home so saddened, all unconscious of the misery 
his coming brought, the boy grew and would not be re- 
pressed. A splendid little fellow, with midnight eyes and a 
tangle of dancing curls, strong, sturdy, beautiful, soon the 
yard, the fields, all the old homestead began to ring with his 
gay laugh and shouts. It was rumored that even to the 
lovely child their animosity and bitterness was extended, but 
let us hope, at least, that this was false. 

A few years passed, and suddenly, quite near to each 
other, father and mother passed away, the first-born made 
a late marriage with a well-to-do widower and removed to 
his home, selling the homestead willed to her by the parents, 
and the sad mother and her little boy took up their abode in 
two rooms on the outskirts of the hamlet, where she earned 
her bread as a tailoress. 

Pleasant to relate, the day of her painful ostracism and 
persecution was over. Old friends received back the long- 
banished girl ; she became a favorite once more, and in the 
village school no boy so bright, so fine a scholar at his age 
as her own little lad. Alas ! poor innocent, he gave her un- 
consciously many a stab in that too tender heart with his 
childish prattle. She sewed from house to house at her busi- 
ness, and once, while so employed, he came running in from 
school, pretty mouth and hands stained with wild berries, 
and flying up to her cried, "Mamma, I've been up on the 
burying ground fence picking blackcaps, and Johnny was 
with me and we saw his daddy's grave ; now, where's my 
daddy's?" Slowly poor Jane wiped the quick starting tears 
from her eyes, and while the sympathizing family essayed 
not to notice, drew the impetuous little fellow to her bosom 
and whispered, "Hush ! hush ! hush !" 

At another time she was assisting a family at the burial 
of its head. They were robed in deepest sable garments, 



WOOINGS AND WEDDINGS 57 

with long crape veils, and he sat near watching the prepara- 
tions. Suddenly he threw his strong young arms impulsively 
about her neck, and said, "Mamma, you forgot to wear such 
nice black clothes for my daddy, didn't you?" And so, many 
a time and oft, his childish remarks were thrusts of anguish 
to her wounded spirit. 

When her boy was about twelve, a party of her towns- 
people prepared to go to the western part of the State, and 
she suddenly announced her intention of accompanying 
them. There was little to attract her to her native place, sad 
spot of memories of shame and regret to her, and though 
kind friends endeavored to dissuade her, she persisted in her 
resolve, and left the town for a new home. She throve amid 
the new surroundings ; in every school her boy was a star 
of the first magnitude, and grew in good looks and sturdy 
health. 

Time wore on, there was a revival in religion, fervid, 
ecstatic, such as new countries experienced, and moved by 
the heart-stirring scene to intense exaltation of spirit, the 
young man arose and exhorted the assembled people. Lo ! 
his vocation opened to him. He soon entered the ministry, 
and grew immediately popular. Handsome, forceful, eloquent, 
he was the pride and choice of his church, and beloved by all. 
As if Nature, in pity for the sorrowful accident of his life, 
never wearied in good gifts to him, he possessed a voice of 
exquisite sweetness, was a rare musician, and with voice and 
touch enhanced his ministry. His marriage was prosperous 
and happy, and the delight and center of his home was the 
once-despised and stricken mother. With him she lived and 
died in peace, and such shadowed happiness as n;ay fall to 
an erring, storm-tossed heart, bitterly repentant of its own 
sad straying. At her death she requested to be brought home 
and laid in her native valley. She made those around her 
promise that they would leave her grave unmarked, and 



58 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

whispered, at the last, that she had forever lost her own name 
and had no other to take its place. 

Her wish was respected and faithfully carried out. One 
calm spring day the narrow house, holding all that was left j 
of her, was brought home, and a few assembled and laid her 
beneath the clods of her birthplace. Among the group was 
an aged woman, bitterly weeping. It was the sister who had 
been so hard and unrelenting, now widowed, childless, alone 
in the world. Amid her sobs she said brokenly, "I don't care 
if Jane did slip, she was the best woman God ever made." 

Was it not a wise pen that wrote, "The tragedies of life 
are not on the stage, they sit by the hearthstone?" 

Early in the last century, a family removed to the West, 
bearing with it a member destined to win honor and fame in 
his new home. After some years passed in the wilds of the 
then far country, he returned to his native town. At a party 
given at the goodly home of an old-time resident, he was an 
honored guest. A dark-eyed daughter, bright and vivacious, 
noted for her melodious rendering of the "songs of long 
ago," sang "Young Lochinvar." She was dressed in scarlet 
crepe, her dark hair curled about her face, and was no doubt 
a charming vision of brightness and grace as she met the 
returned wanderer's eyes. The song was effective, she went 
back with him as his wife, and they died, rich in possessions 
and full of honors, a few years ago. 

In the long, long ago, in a small town in Connecticut, the 
wife and mother was suddenly torn from her family, leaving 
a lonely husband and home. Thereafter, one day, there rode 
forth from the New England village a certain goodly Cap- 
tain, who journeyed to Orange county to purchase horses. 
They were secured and pasture was wanted for them. He 
was informed that he could find it at a farm near the town, 
in the possession of two sisters, and thither the worthy Cap- 
tain wended his way. So delightful was the mansion, so 
agreeable the sisters, that the Captain not only rode thither 



WOOINGS AND WEDDINGS 59 

and bestowed his horses, but remained himself in great com- 
fort during his stay. Now, if any reader, on sentimental 
thoughts intent, for one moment supposes that the Captain 
t| fell in love, there and then, with one of these sisters, no 
greater error ever seized upon him or her. Our Captain had, 
in the Land of Steady Habits, a faithful and loving spousCj 
who kept his home, minded his babies, and was as precious 
a helpmeet as ever gladdened man's heart withal, so he 
wanted not another. 

His visit ended, he journeyed back to New England, and 
told his lonely and stricken friend of his sojourn 'mid the 
hills of Old Orange, and the hospitable home where he had 
been so graciously entertained. Incidentally his friend in- 
quired as to the looks, the bearing and disposition of his 
hostesses, and was given a most excellent and satisfactory 
report. It is not so recorded, but it is firmly believed that 
thereafter he fell to thinking. Indeed, he must have medi- 
tated, for no widower ever did what he soon contemplated 
without so doing. Arraying himself in blue in stately fash- 
ion and mounting a trusty steed, it was not long before he 
found an errand which took him over the same route pursued 
by his friend, which act showed him a much wiser man than 
Myles Standish, as he trusted his wooing to no proxy, but 
went thereon himself. 

Eittle did the homestead anticipate what was in store that 

autumn night. It had been a day of tempest, dark clouds and 

rain and rocking winds, and the two lonely sisters sat by the 

fire awaiting the return of the man who had been hired to 

look after their domain. This individual, be it known, was 

i at that anxious moment stretched upon a wooden settle in a 

well-known hostelry in the village, sleeping off liberal pota- 

i tions of applejack. Long they waited, but, in the words of 

the song, "He came not, O, he came not," and at last the 

^ younger of the sisters decided to go to the barn and look 

^ after the lowing cattle. Arrayed in an old greatcoat and 



6o UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

fur hat unearthed from the garret, she saUied forth, in this 
unique garb, dripping with rain, with wind-blown hair, and 
laden with two pails of water for the horses, she espied an 
equestrian, in a huge cloak, riding toward the barnyard. But, 
let it be written, the daughters of that day were not dismayed 
in the pursuit of duty, and she bade the stranger welcome, 
for that was the fashion of olden time, little minding heir 
quaint and unusual garb. When he had introduced himself, 
she helped her guest to house his dripping steed, and he in 
return assisted her in completing the most necessary 
"chores," and soon they were assembled around the family 
hearthstone. The weather cleared, a wooing sped, and the 
very next visit the Captain's friend made he went home lorn 
and lone no longer, but took the younger sister as his bride. 
From this marriage came descendants of whom their native 
valley may well be proud, and who love it with deatliless 
affection, for such was the wife's fondness for her own home 
that she besought her husband, very soon after the birth of 
their first son, to leave New England and settle there, which 
they did, and a grand pair they were, and a goodly, all the 
days of their earthly pilgrimage. 

In the year 1817 occurred a wooing and wedding on the 
Clark homestead near Warwick of a charmingly romantic 
character, 

A gentleman from Connecticut had occasion to visit our 
town and brought with him his daughter. She was very 
young and a rosebud of sweetness and bloom. After reach- 
ing his destination, business took him farther on, and he 
decided to leave his daughter there and continue his journey 
alone. He found a home for her in the hospitable mansion 
of Mr. Clark. Leaving a canvas bag containing one hundred 
dollars in gold to pay her expenses until he returned, he 
proceeded on his way. Early in the winter there was a large 
party at the Clark home, noted for its merrymakings. Among 
the guests was a young man from Warwick, a descendant of 



WOOINGS AND WEDDINGS 6i 

its early settlers and belonging to one of its most honorable 
families. Right then and there happened a case of "love at 
first sight," proving that oft-quoted phrase no chimera of 
the brain of romancers. 

The courtship was speedy and the young Warwickian and 
the beautiful New England girl were wedded the May fol- 
lowing. A large party was assembled in the gracious Clark 
home to witness the nuptials. Mr. Clark gave the bride away 
and presented her with the bag of gold as a wedding gift. 

No happier marriage is recorded in Warwick's annals. 
As the handsome young pair stood in the spacious parlor re- 
ceiving the congratulations of the guests, the officiating 
clergyman remarked, "How wonderful are the ways of the 
Almighty, who brought this young woman away from Con- 
necticut to be the wife of our townsman." Hospitable and 
whole-souled Mr. Clark, who stood near our grandmother in 
the group, replied, "I don't say the Lord didn't have a hand 
in it, Dominie, for His hand is in everything; but I think I 
was His instrument, for if I hadn't made the party last win- 
ter, this wedding would never have been in the spring, for 
that did the business." 

In the early thirties a little, utterly sad romance cast a 
shadow over vale and hill with its tragic sequel. On the 
brow of the mountain lived a young girl, sweet of face, 
graceful of form, and good as she was lovelv. In the valley 
dwelt a young man of fine family and fair fortune. 

He owned a hundred acres of mountain land, and riding 
through one day to blaze some trees for felling he met the 
girl gathering berries and flowers near her home. She bore 
for him a charm and lure from the first glance, and soon it 
was whispered he was her lover. It was true — an innocent, 
sincere aflfection, that had a heart-breaking end. One morn- 
ing pretty Mary went out berrrving in the wildwood ways. 
Forest fires were in their reaches, but she did not know they 
were so near, as the wind blew strongly from her. Sud- 



62 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

denly it turned, and in a few moments she was enveloped in 
smoke, and the crackling of the flames was distinctly audible. 
She started for home, and, bewildered, terrified, lost her way. 
Her father and neighbors started in quest of her. After the 
blinding smoke had rolled away, carefully they sought in 
thick boots of cowhide through the hot mountain ways. At 
length, under an overhanging rock, they found her, still 
living and able to feebly whisper her terrible experience. 
vShe was borne gently home, but died in a few hours. It was 
a cruel fate for one so good and lovely, a woful ending to a 
boy-and-girl romance. 

In the old stone house of Mr. Benjamin Bradner, once the 
Baptist parsonage, hard by Warwick village, lived the well- 
known and beloved pastor of the church with his wife, who 
shared with him his people's affection. 

And up the hill and down the hill 

Through many changing years, 
They shared each other's happiness 
And dried each other's tears. 
Alas ! Alas ! 
That Death's cold dart 
Such Love can part. 

But it did, and the faithful old vv'ife was "gathered to her 
fathers." After a short season a comely maiden above the 
village became deeply "exercised in her mind." Now what 
more natural than that she should go to her excellent pastor 
for comfort and instruction. And she did go and go, and, in 
fact, went very often. When embarrassed the minister was 
sometimes prone to stammer a little, a very little. As this 
well-favored lamb of his flock sought him more and more for 
consolation, he sometimes became greatly distressed by her 
woe, for what is more upsetting to the ordinary man of 
proper feeling and sympathetic tendencies than a woman's 
tears? Perhaps of all varieties of the salty drops deep con- 
viction of sin mal<ces the most saline. So at times all the 
good pious man could ejaculate, stammeringly, was: "You'll 



WOOINGS AND WEDDINGS 63 

come over it, little girl, you'll come over it." This is the tes- 
timony of his housekeeper, a grim old ex-slave, who looked 
with strong disfavor on the weeping penitent. 

Well, she did "come over it," and came it over the excel- 
lent widower, too, was baptized by him, and married to him, 
and they dwelt in great peace and security in the old stone 
mansion, and it is not believed that the worthy pastor ever 
knew that he was won over and melted by tears until he 
succumbed. But Treenchy, the faithful old slave, knew, 
and told this to my grandmother, their very next door neigh- 
bor. 

One of the ablest historians of the French Revolution once 
remarked that he wrote the sad story of Marie Antoinette 
"with many tears." Indeed, as the pen-pictures of such a 
lovely and unfortunate being formed beneath the writer's 
eyes, well might they have dimmed. Alas ! how many such, 
from all gradations of society, in all ages, have walked the 
thorny path laid out by Destiny's hard hand ? 

In the very first decade of the last century there lived, on 
a farm lying between two villages in this favored section, a 
young girl, said to be the most beautiful of her time. At an 
Independence Day celebration at the county seat her beauty 
was remarked upon through the day, and at a ball given in 
the evening at the tavern she shone beyond compare. Her 
hair was of magnificent length, and of the rare purplish 
ebon seen in the plumage of birds ; her eyes matched it, and 
in her faultless complexion, to quote the ancient romancers, 
"the lily and rose seemed to vie with each other." She was 
bright and witty, as well as beautiful, and had, perhaps, 
some of the wilfulness of assured loveliness, for she looked 
coldly on the farmer lads about her home, and would say, 
with a toss of her handsome head, that she would never 
"milk and scrub keeler tubs for any man." 

Time passed, and a stranger came thither from the South. 
He was dark, with a fine, proud bearing, and met the rural 



64 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

belle at a country dance. Attired in a gown of snowy mus- 
lin, with ribbons of peach-blossom tint, no doubt her charms 
shone resplendent in the fine steps of the cotillions of the day. 
Through the merry evening these two had eyes only for 
each other. The stranger claimed her hand in every dance, 
attended her to the supper, and seemed like one enchanted. 
Soon he was a frequent caller at her father's home, and with 
a polish and address not then common in the secluded vale, 
won all who approached by the magnetism of a pleasing 
exterior. It was said, after all was over, that the plain 
father demurred at the marriage, but the mother seemed in- 
fatuated with her charming daughter's admirer. She fol- 
lowed her father's and mother's "chair," as they jogged to 
the village church on a pillion behind her afifianced lover, and 
many a plain and hard-favored lass doubtless envied the 
beauty her looks and luck. Word went forth that wealth 
and position were his, and that he would bear her to power 
and splendor. 

At length the bridal took place, amid feasting and rejoic- 
ing, and the pride of the valley was borne away to her new 
home. Maybe some very commonplace, wise parents, whose |' 
less grandly dowered daughters were milking night and | 
morning, scrubbing keeler tubs, and rearing men and women- 
to-be in the interim of hard, drudging work, shook their 
heads sagely and prophesied under the breath over all this. 
It is likely, as it is a way we have when meteoric fortune 
comes to our neighbors. 

She came to the old church once after her marriage. She 
wore a crimson velvet cloak, a silk dress that would "stand 
alone," had a burnished brass comb in her beautiful hair, 
and exquisite ruffles of fine ribbed and figured dimity on her 
white neck and wrists. And then she was gone, and as all 
the gossip and excitement of this unusual wooing and wed- 
ding died out, the hamlets scattered through the country 
said : "It might be all right, after all." 



WOOINGS AND WEDDINGS 65 

Years passed, and strange misty stories began to creep 
through her home town. The parents were reticent; they 
always said "she was well." Letters were rare in those far- 
away times. After nine years had passed, however, it was 
told that she had been at her childhood's home, and there 
she was, surely, a sad, broken-hearted creature, and in a 
brief time her reason fled forever. Two little boys, with her 
beauty, came with her, but it is not known what became of 
these children, nor what was true or false in the thousand 
rumors that filled her old town of her hapless wedded for- 
tune. Neither time, nor the weight of years, nor her mys- 
terious sorrows, not even the awful blight of dethroned in- 
tellect, ever quite effaced her marvellous beauty. Her mis- 
fortune was of the purely melancholy type. She seldom 
spoke, but would sit with the long, jetty fringes veiling her 
eyes for hours, and at almost stated intervals would pass her 
hand over her brow, and wearily push away the heavy 
masses of hair. Thus she lingered until kindly death re- 
leased her sorrowful spirit. She was well-born, good, and 
beautiful, and if Fate can feel remorse for its dealings with 
the human, surely it must have experienced some twinges 
for all the ruin of such a promise. Never, in the days of 
her utmost desolation, did she lose her majesty of mien, and 
in all the darkness of her mind she ever commanded respect 
from those in her presence. 

Early in 1800 a stranger came to Warwick and opened a 
business there. After a short time he brought his wife and 
children and resided in the lower part of the village. To the 
amazement of the townfolk who called, they found that the 
wife was a mulatto. It was as far as can be ascertained the 
first case of the kind occurring there. They had two chil- 
dren, William and Mahala, both bright and fine-looking, the 
daughter extremely pleasing in appearance and manners. The 
mother's stor}^ was the oft-repeated one in Southern slave 
days. Her mother was a handsome slave beloved by her 



66 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

master, a wealthy planter. His wife and only son dying, he 
freed her, and settled upon her and their daughter a com- 
fortable sum. The young Northerner, travelling in the 
South, met the bright, well-endowed girl and eventually re- 
turned and married her. After a few years' residence in 
New York City they came to Warwick. They lived a se- 
cluded hfe, the wife devoted to her family, shy of inter- 
course with white neighbors, and rigidly excluding all asso- 
ciation with the slaves then plentiful in the township. The 
husband one Sabbath fell dead in the yard of the Dutch 
Reformed Church. The grief of the widow was pitiful, she 
refused to be comforted, left the town, and all trace of her 
was lost. 

Wlien we write of the past we always speak glibly of cen- 
turies. Indeed, it is vouched for by the daily press that one 
lucky, or unlucky, individual, I fear he could not determine 
which, lived in three. We will only go back to the eighties 
of the seventeenth for this bit of romance, and will inform 
the reader in the beginning that there is nothing startling 
in it. 

Parents have, through all the ages, in the most trying, 
perverse, unreasonable fashion, interfered in the heart affairs 
of children, and the young folks, so beset and opposed in the 
very dearest wishes of their hearts, have moped, pouted, re- 
belled, made vigorous protest, and sometimes thrown off the 
parental yoke altogether and taken matters into their own 
rash hands. Frequently the elders have fallen piteously 
sorry for their unsympathizing and unfeeling attitude, again 
offspring have had to bitterly bewail their refractory and 
headstrong disobedience, and often all have been "pied" in 
one common woe over the family distraction. Though this 
is a small, absolutely authentic story of a genuine elopement, 
it went off so well, and came out so beautifully, that the 
world would never have gotten along half so well without it, 



WOOINGS AND WEDDINGS 67 

and if it had not occurred there would not have been nearly 
so much world as there has been. 

After this long preamble, we will say that there lived once 
a judge of probity, property and pride, with a very sweet and 
modest daughter, and a youth of a goodly, but not rich, old 
family, a vaulting ambition, not yet fledged, and an eye to 
the Judge's daughter. Surreptitious affection is what Dinah 
would call "curus." It, in fact, seems to be the most taking 
of all kinds of the commodity. Though this fair girl had 
many a more eligible lover casting longing eyes upon her, 
she ignored all, and clave to the youth under the paternal 
ban. The awful alliteration of "P's" fencing in her father's 
name had no terrors for the lover. \A'hen, like an honest 
man, he asked her hand, and was refused, he set about form- 
ing himself into a "Committee of Ways and Means" to get 
it. He planned a night, and while the honorable Judge was 
soundly sleeping, happy in the consciousness that the aspiring 
lover was dismissed, snubbed and properly sat down upon, 
Romeo placed a ladder beneath his Juliet's window, and lift- 
ing her over the sill, led her down. Those were lovely days. 
No such harrowing articles as marriage licenses were ever 
heard of there. So, mounting his horse, tethered a little 
away, he lifted her lightly up and hieing to the nearest 
dominie, they were made one. Then he went, Hke the fine 
young fellow that he v>as, and told the Judge that they were 
married. His Honor, being of a judicial cast of mind, and 
having a profound respect for the law, reflected that the 
law^s of nature, God and man had bumped right up against 
him, and, receiving them, forgave them straightway. His 
.new son-in-law said to him. "Father, I know you're not 
proud of me now, but I'll live to make you proud of me," 
and he did. and his children's children's children are proud 
of him to this day. 

He used to tell, with pride, tliat when he lifted his bride- 
to-be over the window-sill, his fingers met and clasped 



68 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

around her slender waist. He was scarcely a man to be re- 
sisted^ as this one anecdote will illustrate. 

The "trained nurse" was an unknown quantity in our fore- 
fathers' domestic happenings, and it came tO' pass that a 
third son was born to the house, and none to help in the 
emergency. So, when the situation became desperate, forth 
sallied the father, and went in search of ministering for the 
helpless ones. On his quest he found a neighbor's daughter 
watering her flowers in the dooryard, to whom he made 
known his dilemma. Young and inexperienced, she refused 
to even entertain the thought of going. Stepping to the 
door, he said to the mother, "Can I have Mattie for two 
weeks?" "Yes," was the reply, while timid Mattie turned 
to flee. Without more ado, he picked her up in his arms, 
set her in the vehicle and drove rapidly home. Arriving 
there he again took her up, carried her in his wife's room, 
laid the eight hours' old baby in her lap, and saying, "Now 
take as good care of them as you can, I'll ask no more," left 
the room. 

The improvised nurse herself, who was so successfully 
pressed into service, used, in relating the story, to conclude 
by saying, "I never was so scared in my life, and I told his 
wife so, but she said, 'Oh! never mind, that's just the way 
he took me.' " She might have replied, "But you were will- 
ing to be kidnapped, and I wasn't," but the young of that day 
were too respectful to their elders to indulge in many happy 
retorts. Thus ends the authentic history of one of the most 
rounded and complete elopements on record in the valley. 

The old Baptist parsonage, long since demolished for an 
unpretending successor on the same site, was once the scene 
of an unusual and romantic marriage. Far away, amid the 
rural scenes of Tompkins County, dwelt the editor of a 
small religious monthly with his wife and two little ones. 
She was gifted with a cultivated mind and much taste for 
writing, and frequently contributed to her husband's unpre- 



WOOINGS AND WEDDINGS 69 

tentioiis periodical. He was also a minister, and with his 
dual duties led an existence of exacting labor, greatly aided 
by his accomplished wife. 

In the South lived a clergyman of the same persuasion, 
with a happy wife and family, who occasionally contributed 
to the little pamphlet published in tlie wilds of New York 
State, and mayhap read with interest the smoothly written 
articles from the pen of the editor's young wife. Suddenly 
her companion died, leaving his widow with little of this 
world's needful resources for her helpless children and 
aging mother. The pastor at Warwick and friends who had 
been interested in her husband's work, learning of her un- 
certain prospects, bestirred themselves, and she was removed 
thither, where she opened a small millinery business in the 
center of the village. 

She was graceful, pleasing, with taste and talent, and 
gained many friends in her new sphere. Meantime, away in 
the far Southern home, the minister's wife lay dying, and 
anon the husband and babes were left alone. 

Two years rolled on, and the daily mail, bumping along 
from Chester, in the old-fashioned stage-coach, occasionally 
brought a letter with a Southern postmark to the widow. 
They came more and more frequently, there was a new light 
and a tremulous smile on the attractive countenance, and all 
her gentle friends took a fresh and absorbing interest in her. 
At length the old parsonage buzzed with preparation under 
its weatherbeaten roof, one noontide the stage set down there 
a stately, handsome man, about forty, and the next evening 
there was a wedding between the widow and the Southern 
minister, the two having never looked upon each other's faces 
before the day preceding their bridal. In a few days the 
little home at Warwick was closed, and the bride, with her 
son and daughter and venerable mother, was borne away to 
North Carolina, where, with her children, she found a new 
and happy life, four more being born to her, of whom three 
survived. 



70 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

So far as data can be gathered, this was the first and last 
wedding in the section where bride and bridegroom met as 
utter strangers. It was a most harmonious marriage, each 
possessing rare personal and mental endowments. Curious 
to state, although a pastor for forty years, the husband never 
preached a funeral sermon. He was wont to declare, he 
never had been, nor would be engaged in such service. 
When his own end came, calm, serene and beautiful, his last 
request was that he should be laid in silence in the grave, 
and this was done. He believed this simple manner of the 
apostolic age the true and most impressive method of burial. 

In all the annals of wooings and weddings, none has been 
gathered of a pair more charming than the above. 

That these interesting reminiscences could be prolonged 
indefinitely is beyond question, for Cupid was just as busy a 
century or two ago as he is now, but no wise scribe multiplies 
words ad infinitum, and so with the following we will close. 

In the beginning, it is well to state that the events now 
about to find place on paper for the first time occurred in a 
comfortable farmhouse on a road leading to three villages, 
familiar to all who dwelt on the rich borderlands of old War- 
wick town. The dwellers thereof originally came from that 
people who said "God made the sea, but the Hollander made 
the land/' who put upon their tiles such thrifty maxims as 
"Time is precious," "Time is money," and of whose simple, 
hard-working people a Spanish Commander once wrote, in 
the siege of Haarlem, "These citizens do as much as the best 
soldiers in the world could do." So they were of good stock, 
which is the best of all beginnings, and if a little heady, have 
we not heretofore shown that baffled affection will many 
times and oft beget this very trait in the best of folk ? 

The eldest son of this worthy house, when he reached man's 
estate, took unto himself a wife from the adjacent land of 
Sussex, also of Dutch descent, and as no daughter had ever 
been born to his ancestral home, he brought her there, and 
she proved one, indeed. It can be imagined how she spun, 



WOOINGS AND WEDDINGS 71 

wove, Icnit, sewed, scrubbed, sanded, made curds and whey 
and cheese as a good wife and daughter should. P)Ut an 
outbreak of that fell enemy to life, spotted fever, visited the 
fair vale, and in spite of hemlock sweats and fearful bow^s 
of w^ormwood and snake root, and bitter doses of bark and 
v/ine, the loved husband died and left the young wife a 
widow after two years of connubial bliss. Then, very lonely 
and heartbroken, she was minded to go back to her father's, 
but her mother-in-law made such grievous and woful lament 
that she stayed. 

The second son was a strapping youth of twenty-four, in 
fact, a veritable Anak, and hardly had the grass rooted over 
the dust of his brother before all knew his widowed sister- 
in-law had found favor in his eyes. But it was not returned, 
although she worked on as patiently as ever, churned, baked 
and brewed, piled high the board with crullers and dough- 
nuts, as a good housew'ife should, kept the moth from the 
dear departed's clothes, and was a most seemly and rightly 
disposed widow, indeed. But after a year and a half had 
flown, Anak began to make swift, vigorous and warm as- 
sault upon the little heart so closed and cold. It has never 
been determined yet whether proximity eases or aggravates 
the pangs of unrequited affection. The idiosyncrasies of 
heart trouble will cause this ever to remain a vexed and 
open question. In this particular case, I think it had the 
effect on the big soft fellow, head and heels in love, of a — - 
well, let us see — mustard plaster on the throbbing organ. It 
was maddening. In this strait he went to his mother. "As 
one whom his mother comforteth" is a beautiful chain of 
sweet words, but they don't always do it, not ahuays. No 
doubt this bereaved mother had felt often that the Almighty 
had dealt very bitterly with her in snatching her first-born 
son from love and life and happiness, and the consecration of 
his bridal was perhaps still lingering in her heart, for she 
berated Anak and told him to "let the poor girl alone," and 



72 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

that he ought to be ashamed of himself. Then he, Uke 
Jacob of old, "lifted up his voice and wept/' with far more 
cause, for Jacob had just had the privilege of a kiss, but 
this chilly, prudish widow had never even given poor Anak 
one tender glance. At this juncture the mother's heart 
melted, and she told the lover to keep quiet, and then per- 
haps thoughts began to weave in her slow Holland mind of 
how nice it would be to have this good girl^, once a daughter, 
always a daughter, and she agreed and promised the great 
blubbering fellow right there to speak for him in due time 
and season. And this she did, and was met by a firm and 
unmistakable "No," and was furthermore told that sooner 
than bear this siege, the widow would depart for Sussex 
County to her own kindred and people. And so the mother 
had naught to do but to tell her troubled and anxiously 
waiting boy the truth. 

Poor Anak ! it was a sad blow, and on it the whole family 
slept that night and woke in the morning to find him gone. 
Gone ? Truly, yes, and with him the family saddle-bags, and 
the very best of his ruffled shirts and good homespun 
clothes, and a fine roan horse with strawberry markings, the 
very horse his brother used to ride down into Sussex to an 
old stone house to court that girl, so soft and yielding to 
him, so congealed and obdurate to himself. His purse of 
green silk, filled with silver and gold, went with him. Such 
search was made as could be instituted before telegraphs, 
telephones, detectives, police and like modern innovations 
were known, but Anak was not found. A lonely, lonelier 
than ever house was that through the long, snowbound win- 
ter. I fear that mother's heart was in rebellion against 
that daughter-in-law now, for her last son was gone. They 
came to the village church, had to drive themselves, tether 
their own horse, and carry in their own foot-stoves, all of 
which Anak used to do, and a boy was hired for help, a 
poor substitute for their own. 



WOOINGS AND WEDDINGS 73 

Finally Fate, that horrific upsetter of the peace and com- 
fort of poor humanity, laid the good mother very ill with 
typhus fever. Here, let it be remarked, that had plumbing 
been introduced then, only it was neVer heard of, it is firmly 
believed that the work on that ancestral home would have 
been declared out of order and all sanitary arrangements 
not up to date, or why should fever again smite the devoted 
household? She lay many weeks, but at last, as the May 
roses began to bud, slowly crept back to strength and health. 
And then there came a letter to the post-office, and it bore 
the name of that very pale and worn-with-watching young 
widow on it. For she had "held the fort" through all that 
weary siege, faithfully done every duty, assisted by her own 
good Dutch mother, and never called one halt until the 
stricken patient began to live again. And then down sick 
she went, but not before she had answered the letter. 

So it fell out that about one week after, Anak's roan horse 
was quietly munching his vesper corn in his own stall, and 
his master was just imprinting a kiss on a face almost as 
white as the pillow on which it lay. Perhaps some slow di- 
gesting mind will think it was his mother Anak was salut- 
ing, for a man should always be his mother's first, best, all- 
round lover, but it was not. It was that frozen small widow, 
so melted down by trouble, sickness, hard work, watching, 
and the thought that she was nearly the unwitting slayer of 
her mother-in-law in robbing her of her last child, and 
thereby precipitating a fever, that she was softened into the 
most delightful state of charming and sweetly acquiescent 
kindness a lover ever dreamed of. These two lived long and 
happily, in fact, grew old and gray together. 

A young reader might feel, as these pages are read, a little 
contempt for the widow, that 

She who had lately loved the best 
So soon forgot she loved at all, 



74 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

but ripened years and mature reflection will teach a calmer 
judgment. Surely she tried and wished to be faithful to 
the memory of her first love, but what could one lone woman 
do beset by a lover insistent and impetuous, a mother-in- 
law like Paul of old, in a strait betwixt two, namely, ner- 
vous prostration, called "low-po" in those early days, and 
fever? Who would not have capitulated, in fact, gone and 
done likewise? 

"A critic by the hearth," who gained access to this manu- 
script, wished to know how Huldah made the flip and short- 
cake, when she entered on her diplomatic career. 

In tlie first place, a genuine good cider flip could nevdr 
be made until Boreas came with "bitesome breezes and blew- 
some blastesses" and froze the barrel of cider in the garret. 
Then a hot iron was inserted and a pitcher of the "heart" 
drawn forth. Into this allspice, ginger and cinnamon were 
lightly sprinkled and good browned sugar mingled with a 
tiny lump of butter. Then a portion of peach-brandy, 
sweetened with honey, was added, and a poker inserted 
until the whole was steaming hot. This was genuine cider 
flip, and in some homes, an iron kept for heating the mixture 
was called a "flip-dog." 

And how did Huldah make that shortcake? Did it com- 
pare with the soda-biscuit of these latter days ? Ah, did it ? 
Let us see. 

When Huldah was done churning in the fall, she partly 
filled divers and sundry deep crocks with buttermilk, and 
poured cold water over them. The water was changed and 
renewed many times until the buttermilk assumed the con- 
sistency of snowy ice-cream ; then the water was carefully 
poured off and it was gathered and set in a cold place for 
winter use. Now Huldah had never heard of baking- 
powder, never. Those women of blessed memory knew 
not this modernity. When her father shelled corn he threw 
out the largest, finest, whitest cobs, and these Huldah dried 



WOOINGS AND WEDDINGS 75 

and then dedicated to a holocaust, and from that gathered a 
substance called pearlash, which, combined with the lactic 
acid of her deliciously rich buttermilk, one pinch of salt, a 
cup of butter and lard, newly laid eggs, and flour from 
their own wheat, freshly ground, made such shortcake as, 
humping themselves in that old Dutch oven, we, alas ! shall 
never taste. 

The pen lingers fondly over the finis of these long-gone 
wooings, and makes no apology for giving them resurrec- 
tion. Surely, it has put no "rude finger among the heart- 
strings" in so doing. Poor hearts ! they are dust long, long 
ago. They began to pulsate in early, stern and uncom- 
promising times, but they behaved in all their affairs just as 
yours has done, sisters of to-day, and brothers also, and 
verify the truth, the strength of that old saying we all know, 
and have often quoted, "Hearts are ever the same." 

Ever a question of momentous importance to the bride 
elect is the wedding gown. Here is a very old-time rhyme 
which all future brides should carefully scan, for it has been 
tried and proved: 

Married in white. 

You have chosen all right ; 

Married in gray, 

You will go far away ; 

Married in black, 

You will wish yourself back ; 

Married in red, 

You'd better be dead ; 

Married in green, 

Ashamed to be seen ; 

Married in blue. 

You'll always be true ; 

Married in pearl, 

You'll live in a whirl; 

Married in yellow, 

Ashamed of the fellow ; 

Married in brown. 

You'll live out of town ; 

Married in pink, 

Your spirits will sink. 



IV 

Memories of 
Old Northern Slaves 




IV 



Memories of Old Northern Slaves 




For sale in this town, a stout healthy negro man. Inquire of the 
Printer. 

[HOULD these lines meet the eyes of the read- 
ers of either of Warwick's newspapers of to- 
day, spreading abroad their budget of news 
'and hteratnre, it is very hkely a shock of in- 
tense astonishment and indignation would be 
general. But in the last century they were very common, 
and created no wonder as they appeared in the weekly news 
sheets. 

On a pleasant afternoon in the early 40's a party of vener- 
able ladies were visiting together, and "helps' " manifold 
shortcomings and imperfections, self-assertiveness and blun- 
ders became the theme of conversation, as the good dames 
clicked their knitting needles. 

"It wasn't so, Nancy," said one, "when a body could just 
drive out to a sale and buy a good nigger and wench. How 
they zvould work ! Old Phila would do more in a day than 
a white hired girl would do in three." 

"Yes," interpolated another, "when well whipped they 
would." 

"Well, I always said," was the reply, "that zve got more 
out of our niggers, with less whipping, than anybody 
around." 

Were there sales of human beings in this fair section of 
New York State? And were they noted and attended? 
Yea, verily, and these were the notices, copied verbatim, on 



8o UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

seeing which our forefathers jogged comfortably to the 
auction, made their bids, bought their property, and returned 
with it securely bound. 

FOR SALE. — A stout negro man named Jack. Is twenty-three 
years of age, five feet, four inches high, thick set, and square built, 
full black. Is a good farm hand; will be sold very reasonable. 

"But," cries one, to whom this reads like the Spanish 
Inquisition, the heads picketed on London Bridge, the 
French Revolution, and Salem witchcraft, "they never 
treated slaves here as they did elsewhere." 

What shall be answered to this question? 

It may be said that they didn't have so many to treat, but 
those they owned did not find life all roses, else why, in a 
given time, is there one sale advertised and seven notices 
like this? 

TEN DOLLARS REWARD.— Ran away from the Subscriber on 
Monday, the 6th instant, July, a negro man named Grant, five feet 
nine inches high, spare made, very black, broken in his speech. Had 
on when he went away an old wool hat, a purple brown cloth coat, 
a waistcoat and a pair of tow trowsers, and old coarse shoes. Who- 
ever will take up said negro and secure him so that I can get him 
again shall be entitled to the above reward and all reasonable 
charges. 

"Oh!" cries some tender heart, "what an awful thing to 
appear in our papers." Nevertheless it did, in our bona fide 
county paper, about the first decade of the last good century. 
It was a very small sheet of four pages, just seventeen and 
one-half inches long and eleven inches wide, that Elliot 
Hopkins, Esq., furnished the county folk of Orange, but it 
proclaimed the biggest blot on that beautiful portion of our 
land ever known. 

"Oh, well !" exclaims somebody, "I suppose everybody 
had slaves in those days ; all were ^tarred with the same 
stick.' " 

Alack ! even so, and among the earliest remembrances of 
the writer lives Serena, Rosette, Mitty, Roseanne, Sukey, 



OLD NORTHERN SLAVES 8i 

Dine and Bets, as, after their emancipation, they came to 
visit or aid their old mistresses, and patted all the small 
folk with child-loving fondness. 

In every instance of absconding- property of the male 
persuasion, a reward of ten and twenty dollars is offered for 
its apprehension, but the following notice will show a dif- 
ferent appreciation of the value of feminine flesh and blood : 

FIVE DOLLARS REWARD.— Ran away from the Subscriber 
on Sunday, the 9th August, a negro woman named Sarah, twenty 
years o£ age. Had on when she went away a blue and white calico 
short-gown, a homespun brown petticoat, old straw hat and a pair 
of old shoes that had been mended. She is supposed to be lurking 
about Goshen or Dolscntown, as she had lived in both of those 
places. 

Poor Sarah ! She did not go in the family carryall to 
church, but remained at home and pared the potatoes and 
watched the babies, doubtless, that hot August day, and as 
she worked she thought there was such a thing as freedom 
in the wide, fair world, and she set out in the calico short- 
gown and old straw hat, the homespun petticoat and mended 
shoes to find it. Ah ! I fear they found her and sent her 
back, and somebody got that five dollars. She was worth 
only five, being a woman, you see. Had she worn a short 
coat instead of a short gown, her goin' away advertisement 
would have been a companion to this : 

TWENTY DOLLARS REWARD.— Ran away from the Sub- 
scriber on the 14th of June a negro man named Jonah. Said slave 
had on, and took with him when he went away, two hats, one roram 
and the other wool, one kerseymere short coat, one red and yellow 
I vest, one thin yellow vest, one white, one pair of hunter's cord 
trowsers, one pair of nankeen trowsers, one pair of shoes, one thick 
with a spur piece on, the other thin, lined and bound. Said Jonah 
does not touch any liquor unless it is sweetened. Whoever will 
take up said runaway and return him to his Master or secure him in 
any jail, so that his Master shall get him again, shall be entitled to 
the above reward and all reasonable charges be paid. 

Now, it has ever seemed to me that Jonah's master was 
entitled to more respect than any other slave-owner whose 



82 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

name and address stands at the foot of these yellow, time- 
tattered advertisements. In the first place, Jonah had good 
clothes, and in the second, he had been given sugar as he 
wanted, and that speaks well for Mr. Blanque, or may be it 
was Mrs. Blanque, who said wdien Jonah was hot and 
aweary, or cold and chilled, "Here, Jonah, put this lump of 
sugar in your dram ; it will taste better," and so cultivated 
the saccharine habit. 

The word "jail" looks badly in the notice. I wish Mr. 
Blanque had left that out, but then, anyway, poor Jonah 
Eightfoot had three vests to his blessed back, and a nice 
pair of light shoes to rest and comfort his flitting feet. He 
couldn't help running away, considering whose namesake 
he was. Peradventure the name of Jonah would have been 
a misnomer. 

Among the most amusing of all the old ex-slaves was 
Tone. His right and proper cognomen was undoubtedly 
Antonio, but he was always known as "Tone." In his old 
age, after his freedom, he always remained with some mem- 
ber of our family. Tone's mortal frame was small and 
spare, his face thin and troubled, and he had the most comi- 
cal stammer, when worried or excited. His wool frizzed 
tight to his scalp, and was very grizzled. 

Tone was a sort of Martha in all labor, ever careful and 
troubled. As his little shrunken form sped hither and 
thither, he had a habit of groaning in the most dismal man- 
ner, and a stranger would have thought him in the deepest 
affliction. One morning the master of the house went away, 
leaving, on His departure, sundiy injunctions to Tone. 
Soon after, he was heard groaning more lugubriously than 
was his wont. Seated on the porch with her sewing, his 
mistress became at length thoroughly annoyed by his lamen- 
tations. 

"What docs ail you, Tone?" she exclaimed, at last, in 
irritation. "Are you sick? I never heard you take on so." 



OLD NORTHERN SLAVES 83 

11 "O no! 11-0, n-o-o, no, Mis' M'randy," he answered, "but 
I I wish I could go dead." 

"What do you want to die for. Tone?" she asked. 
]\ "Oh, then I wouldn't have but one ting to tink of," he 
rephed. "Now I got the pigs, the calves and chickens. 1 
wish I could go dead; dey don't have but just one ting to 
tink of." 

"What is that. Tone ?' inquired his amused questioner. 

'Oh, jes' when dey goin' to git out," he answered, with 
fresh moans, as he trudged on. 

Tone lived to a good old age. He had some knowledge 
of the blacksmith's craft, but was always in mortal terror of 
a horse's heels, and this fear practically unfitted him for 
usefulness at the business. His employer was a smith in his 
early youth, and in later years continued to keep the forge 
' for his own use, being a lover and fancier of horses. One 
day Tone was called to hold a young horse to be shod. The 
animal was extremely nervous and sensitive over the opera- 
tion. Poor Tone was holding on to the bridle with all the 
strength of his meager frame, when all at once the irritated 
beast bit at him savagely. Loosing his grasp. Tone fled in 
wild dismay, and slipped and fell in the brook near the shop. 

"What did you let go for. Tone?" shouted his irate 
master. 

"O, God A'mighty, mister," he replied, " 'cause he's just 
as dangersome one end as de odder," and with his usual 
heartrending moans, Tone proceeded to pour the water from 
his shoes, while his master caught the horse. 
j In the last 3'eiars of his life, Tone became grievously 
jafflicted with rheumatism. His one unfailing remedy was 
ian ointment made of the datura strauwnium, only poor Tone 
never knew the ill-odored weed by this high-sounding appel- 
lation. He just called it "stinkweed," good plain Saxon, 
it [and simmered it in skunk's grease, and said all the doctors 
in the town couldn't limber him up as that could, with a 



84 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

good hot bowl of "Princey pine" tea each night. He was a 
pathetic figure as he sat in the shop, rubbing his poor 
wizened calves with tlie all-comforting ointment, and sim- 
mering his "Princey pine" tea at the forge, pouring it down 
his throat so unmercifully hot that he was often warned 
that he would "scald himself." i 

"Never ! never !" he would reply, with energy. "There's 
only one way with this rheumatiz. Scald it right out, and 
tlien rub it right off. It can't stand that," and, wonderful to 
relate, with such exorcising as his tea and ointment pro- 
vided, Tone kept on his feet to life's latest day, held the evil 
spirits at bay, and was never troubled with doctors' bills. 
His mortal remains were laid in the old family burying- 
ground, and there, be it hoped, poor Tone realized the dear- 
est wish of his heart — "gone dead" — with but one thing to 
think of. 

Bets — for such was her abbreviated title all her life — - 
was a slave in the Wood family. Her mother was Dine,!, 
and came from New Windsor, on the Hudson. Bets was a i 
character worthy of a more graphic pen than that which 
now seeks to rescue her memory from total oblivion. As a 
child her pranks were legion. Being left once with Sally* 
and Mattie, two little daughters of the family, to pick wool I 
in the absence of her mistress, she was told she could "pick? 
away" while they went to "hunt eggs." Now Bets dearlyy 
loved to scour the hens' nests, too, and took it in highi)i 
dudgeon that she was ordered to stay behind. When the!^ 
little girls returned and resumed their work, she was no-'-| 
where to be found. There lay the great piles of wool in the.{ 
room, soft and slumbrous, but no Bets anywhere. Dowr 
they sat, anathematizing her as they each grasped a lock oJ 
wool and pulled away industriously. 

"She's just gone down in the meadow to dig calamus, oi 
over to the v;oods to pick wintergreen berries," they com- 
mented severelv. 



OLD NORTHERN SLAVES 85 

Thus they sat and worked at the sleep-inducing occupation 
until they were almost nid-nid-nodding, when suddenly the 
heap of wool began to move ; it parted, and out sprang a 
horrid apparition with a chalk-white ghastly face, swathed 
in a sheet after the most approved ghostly fashion, for how- 
ever up to date the flesh may be in matters of dress, ca- 
pricious and desirous of latest and most correct styles, the 
spirit has always clung to the simply severe costume of a 
sheet. In wild dismay, almost frantic with fright, the little 
girls tumbled over each other in efTorts to get away, nor did 
Bets's shrill screams of elfish laughter reassure them, or 
check their disordered flight. 

They loved to tease and annoy her in various ways ; to 
pull the little kinky braids wherewith she decorated her 
wool, to untie her tow apron slyly, to confiscate her "Paas" 
(Easter) eggs, to hide her one dear ornament, a string of 
blue glass beads^ and otherwise to harry poor Bets, but she 
was a favorite with her mistress, and when she put on her 
paint and set out on the warpath against her small torment- 
ors, she was rarely called to account, the good mother, per- 
haps, making use of that time-honored and hackneyed 
phrase, familiar to mother-tongue through all time, "You 
got just what you deserved." 

One autumn day, as little Mattie was playing about, Bets 
suddenly appeared with w^ide, bulging eyes. "O Mattie! 
I've found something," she cried; "a tree full of the bu'ful- 
lest red apples ever was, close by the woods. Come quick ! 
come quick!" No second invitation was needed, and Mattie 
trudged gaily forth in Bets's wake, on, on, until the dark 
shadows of the woods were before them. 

"Where, Bets? I don't see any red apples," she cried, 
becoming distrustful. 

They had reached the low-spreading boughs of a giant 
elm. Squaring suddenly, and facing her tormentor, Bets 
said : 



86 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

''No, nor you won't. This is what you'll see, Mat; now 
I'm going to pay you off for old and new," and untying her 
tow apron and laying it carefully on the ground, that it 
might not impede her movements, Bets seized the luckless 
Mattie and gave her such a drubbing as she never forgot, 
finishing with the adjuration, "Now I guess you'h let me 
alone after this." 

After the slaves were manumitted in New York State, 
Bets removed to Newburgh to care for her mother Dine, 
then nearly a hundred years old. Time passed, and occa- 
sionally it was learned that Bets was well. One pleasant 
spring morning in the late fifties, the time-worn door 
knocker faintly rapped. When the door opened, a bowed 
and aged negress was found at the portal. 

"Is Mattie alive?" she inquired, tears streaming down her 
withered cheeks. She was conducted to her, and joyous d 
was the meeting between the two, poor old Bets alternately ■' 
laughing and crying, as she gazed with fond, delighted eyes 
on her old playmate. Then- affection and pleasure was 
mutual. They talked of old, old times, of the dead and 
gone, their merry childhood, and all at once Bets exclaimed : 

"O Mattie ! do you remember the warming I gave you 
under the old ellum tree ?" and then they laughed afresh. 

The venerable woman remained nearly a week, and no 
more welcome guest ever sat under the roof. They parted, 
never to meet again, both dying but a few weeks apart a 
few years after. 

Serena was a tall, amply formed negress, her whole ap- 
pearance imposing and majestic. A belle might have envied 
her her fine teeth, even in old age. Her laugh was so sweet 
and infectious that it was music. She was a dear lover of 
babies, and was never without one in her arms, when they 
could be persuaded in. When her visits were further apart 
than usual, it was sometimes quite a task to win Baby over 



OLD NORTHERN SLAVES 87 

to her motherly hosom, and amid ineffectual attempts she 
would exclaim in dolorous accents : 

"Sho, now, jes" see, it comes of bein' black, and it don't 
know it won't rub off." 

After Baby was at last captured her joy knew no bounds. 
I'he pretty hair, the snowy skin came in for unstinted praise, 
and hugging it to her bosom, she would say:, 

"And so white ! so white ! so white !" 

To be childless, in Serena's eyes, was the most terrible of 
earthly afflictions. If any ancient family fell upon this mis- 
fortune, she would bemoan it with lamentations worthy of 
the prophets of old. 

"Sho' now," would be her comment, "an' dey all dyin' out : 
nobody to have dat fam'ly name ; nobody to keep up dat ol' 
place?" 

Sometimes she would ask : 

"When de ol' heads under de dirt, who get it anyway?" 

An opinion ventured would invariably rouse her ire. 

"What business dey got with it?" she would retort, in a 
high key. "Did dey airn it? No! Did dey take care o' it? 
No ! Did dey brack deir ban's airnin' dat white money ? 
'T aint right no^ ways," and her finely poised head would 
quiver with indignation. 

She was a firm believer in the right of primogeniture. 
Once referring to a famil}' where the eldest born son was 
not brilliant, and had been left the homestead estate, the 
next son very bright, she commented : 

"What bus'ness he got all the brains for; dey's in the 
wrong skull. De head o' de house orto hev' de wits." 

Serena always wore a high, snowy turban wound around 
her head. Her last hours were typical of her name. She 
had not been feeling very strong, and had drawn her fa- 
vorite large chair near a sunny window in her little cot to 
remain while her daughter went into the village for a few 
necessaries. When she returned she found her still sitting 



88 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

there. Her head had fallen forward, her face was hidden in 
her ample bosom, her turban at her feet. She was dead. 
The fine old head was never lifted again, and thus, pain- 
lessly, serenely she passed away. A second time she was 
free. 

Mitty was the delight of little children. She had the gift 
of telling marvellously fascinating stories about fairies, 
witches and spirits, individually and collectively. Seated in 
front of the fire, she would seize the huge shovel, hammer 
the back-log, and make "the folks go to meetin'/' to our 
immense satisfaction. The last spark to ascend the chimney, 
when she tired, was the sexton. When they begged for just 
one more shower of sparks, Mitty would declare "the meet- 
in' out, folks a-ridin' home, door locked, sexton jes' goin' off \ 
the meetin'-house stoop," and no persuasion could induce 
her to give the back-log another rap. 

Poor Mitty 's domestic happiness was cut short in quite a 
distressing way. Her husband, Josephus, was a smith. One 
morning, vv'hile working at his forge, he was seized with a 
;errible pain under the left shoulder-blade. Going to the 
house, he informed Mitty, who seated him in a chair, satu- 
rated a cloth with liniment, placed it over the spot and 
clapped thereon a hot flatiron, to drive out the pain. In the 
space of a minute or two poor Seph tumbled from the chair 
dead. Mitty's shrieks aroused the neighborhood, but all 
effort was unavailing ; he never breathed more. She would 
recount again and again this sore afiliction, and say : | 

"If I'd let that iron alone — if I on'y jes' had," while tears 
would course down her dark cheeks. 

Mitty was a firm believer in witches. Though witch 
Glories were not in favor with parents, many a deliciously 
awful one was surreptitiously told the youngsters when they 
w^re absent, during her visits. She v/ould recount how in 
witch-days hens could be found in the morning "witched 
stone-dead," standing right on the ends of their bills on the 



5I 



OLD NORTHERN SLAVES 89 

perches, only IVIitty called them "roost poles." How a poor 
old slave she knew was nightly turned, by a wicked witch, 
into a black horse and whipped and spurred and almost 
driven to death, and then threatened next day by his master 
because he was so lame and sore he could accomplish but 
half-a-day's work. How one morning her own mother's 
coffee-mill wouldn't turn "no-how," and being searched for 
a pebble, a cricket jumped out and sat on the post whereon 
the mill was screwed and kicked its heels and laughed in 
her face, and being "clipped" with the s'pawn-stick, hopped 
off with a broken foreleg, and right away a doctor was sent 
for to set the broken arm of the wicked witch on the moun- 
tain. When he reached there he found the awful creature 
savagely splitting up her s'pawn-stick with a hatchet, and 
while the doctor was setting her arm, a merry little cricket 
chirped on the door-stone, and she flew out, bandages dang- 
ling, splints scattered, and reduced him to a spot, vowing 
she hated these chirping small boders of luck worse than 
snakes. 

"And can witches turn into crickets, Mitty?" round-eyed 
questioners would ask. 

"Sho', chillen," slie would answer, complacently, "crickets 
or oxes — makes no difference which." 

Once, in the winter, when snow was deep and the meat 
dwindled low, Seph, on going out in the morning, found a 
fine black pig in the pen. 

"Right over in de pen," Mitty averred, "lookin' jes' to 
hum." 

Inquiry was made all around, but no missing porker could 
be heard of. Then pious Seph concluded he must have been 
"sent" to help them out, fed him carefully and at last when 
of due proportions, on consulting the Squire and the min- 
ister, and gaining their approval, decided to slay him for 
use. On the eventful morning Seph, accompanied by Mitty, 
went out to the pen, and to use her own words, "clum in," 



90 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

the butcher-knife, well sharpened^ m hand. At this point in 
Mivty's tale, her voice always sank to a whisper, her eyes 
looked cavernous and dark, and all invariably drew closer 
together, and felt chilly and dry in the throats, but not a 
soul dare go to the family water-pail for a drink. 

"Now," Mitty would continue, "jes' as quick as Seph had 
clum in dat pen, and seize dat shoat, he riz up an' storked 
right ober de side. Seph made a dash at him with the knife 
an' jes' slit his nose as he larruped out. And, chillen, what 
do you think?" Mitty would continue warming to her sub- 
ject. "Dat week dere came word de very worst wizard on 
the mount'n, dat dey said had been working in de mines all 
winter, had come home with de end of his nose split right 
open, and dey done it up in pine-pitch, and he wore it done 
up days and days and weeks," Mitty would finish. 

When interrogated as to why witches and wizards in- 
vaded her home with such dire malignity, Mitty would reply: 

"Oh, 'twan't us ownerly ; 'twas ebrybody's folks ; they 
kep' busy." 

When, with the far thoughts and general persistency of 
childhood, the little ones would ask what had become of all 
these eerie people and why their diablerie had ended, Mitty 
would aver: 

"Dey mos'ly dies out. De las' one got lonesome and jes' 
went to de jumpin'-off place on ol' Hogback and keeled 
right off, and broke his neck." Being gathered up from a 
blackberry-patch like the poor young man in "The House 
That Jack Built," "all tattered and torn" from his mad leap 
to death, he was buried "top o' Hogback an' not one spear o' 
grass or even hoss-sorrel ever growed on his grave. Never 
does," Mitty would assert, "top o' deir graves ; my ol' granny 
always said so." 

Mitty died, full of years, and when it was learned that 
she was gone, she was sincerely mourned and the kind old 



OLD NORTHERN SLAVES 91 

black face sorely missed. She retained her faith in witch- 
craft to life's latest day. 

Tradition said tliat her name was given lier by her mother 
Waanche, vAio one day heard her master, in conversation 
with a friend, speak of the manumitting of the slaves. She 
knew that the word meant freedom for her race, and from 
it gathered the name, Mitty, for her babe. 

Samp (Sampson) was another ex-slave, whose face was 
familiar to the childhood of that day, as with slow, laborious 
movements he faithfully toiled. His forte was laying stone- 
fence. In this branch Samp was an artist. The precision, 
beauty and durability of his fences challenged comparison. 
Samp had one failing that grievously worried his employers. 
He zuould go "wood-chucking." When found absent from 
his work on this alluring sport and reprimanded, his one 
plea invariably was : 

**S3'lvy docs like 'em so, she does ; she said I mus'n' come 
home without one." 

One day, in a family access of work, Sylvia was called 
upon to assist in "wash-washing" the walls, as she termed 
it. A boy on the farm found Samp away from his work in 
the afternoon, and discovered him setting his chuck-trap in 
the woods. While bringing the cows at night the boy spied a 
fine woodchuck in the trap, and bore it home with pride to 
Samp, who was eating his vesper meal on the porch with 
Sylvia, preparatory to going home. 

"Here, Samp," he called, holding it up with a flourish, 
"look what a big one you've got to-night !" 

Now it was currently whispered that Samp was a little 
henpecked, and on this account, and because of Sylvia's ex- 
cessive fondness for the meat. Samp's vanishings after 
woodchucks were nearly always condoned. When this 
specimen met Sylvia's gaze, as she comfortably sipped her 
tea in the shade of the vines, fire and wrath shot from her 



92 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

uplifted eyes, and indignation limbered her tongue. Samp 
was berated Vv^ith unsparing vigor. 

"Why ! Sylvia, I thought you were so very fond of wood- 
chucks," said his employer, summoned to the scene by the 
noise of the fray. 

"No sir-ee," cried Sylvia, entirely forgetting her usual 
respectful manner in her anger. "I hates 'em — nasty, greasy 
things. They eats pizen weeds, an' they is pizen," reiterated 
Sylvia. 

"Why ! Samp, how is this ?" queried the master of the 
house, puzzled. 

I'oor Samp ! His nose nearly sought his shoes. Slowly 
he spoke. 

"Well, mister, she don't allcrs like 'em, an' when she don't, 
why I tries 'em for the ile, and sells it fur harness grease." 

"He ! Grease ! Sell it !" retorted Sylvia, wrathfully. "He 
eats it all an' licks the platter." 

Samp and Sylvia lived together many long years, and died 
full of honors for their faithfulness. 

Rosette was indeed an African. No base white blood ever 
mingled with the rich tropical stream that coursed through 
her veins. She was intensely black. Ebony, midnight paled 
beside her ; indeed, she often remarked, with a mellow laugh, 
"Charcoal make white mark on Rosette." 

She was born a slave, where is not known, but always re- 
ferred to it with horror, saying: 

"Once vv'e was pigs and cows, but now, 'come in, nigger, 
go out, nigger, who's going to hender ye ?' " 

She had a hatred for a mulatto, called them "bad-pennies," 
and said, "The Lord never made 'em." Chiding or punish- 
ment to a little one ever roused her ire. "Guess if they 
cotched it every time they did a thing, and got a clip every 
turn, they'd be mince-meat," .she would remark of tlie 
parents. 



OLD NORTHERN SLAVES 93 

Her terse sayings would fill a book. Often, when a 
clergy^man passed, she wonld remark : 

"I wonder, I do wonder, if yon allers practise what you 
preach ?" 

This remark was once conveyed to the minister, and, spy- 
ing Rosette in the yard, he said : 

"Alas ! Rosette that is the greatest trouble I have." 

"I thought so," she answered, grimly. 

Indeed, Rosette had no liking for the professions. She 
would say : 

"Doctors killed more than they cured, and lawyers got fat 
by picking geese." 

Rosette once made a profession of religion and united 
with a church, but with a rheumatic husband, chickens, and 
children to care for, ceased to attend service entirely. When 
chided by a colored sister punctilious in all duties, she re- 
torted : 

" 'Tain't likely the Lord 'spected I'd hold out anyway, 
v/ith so much on my hands." 

To her race, aping their while neighbors in dress and 
manners, she had a distinct aversion. "Nudder white nor 
black," she would declare, "jes' smut." 

Once, on being told by a colored girl that she was allowed 
to eat with the family where she lived, she replied, scorn- 
fully, "They must like huckleberries and n.iilk." 

She was as full of proverbs and odd sayings as Sancho 
Panza himself. When anything was arranged for con- 
venience and fell short of its mission (as often occurred in 
household matters), she would remark, sarcastically, 
"Handy ! oh, yes ! handy as two saws and nary buck in a 
woodpile o' logs." When a prediction was ventured in fam- 
ily converse, she would shake her head and exclaim, "No, 
't won't, 'tain't no sign of a duck's nest when you see a fed- 
der on a log." 

She was an unfalterins: believer in "righteous retribution." 



94 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

l^jikindness, meanness, stuck-up-ness (her own coinage of a 
wcrd) she abhorred. "They'll get it for that," was her 
sententious comment, "get it as the cat give it to the owl ; 
over the face and eyes," 

Her nature possessed a curious streak of odd vindictive- 
ness. Woe to the graceless youth who failed to get her 
kindlings and wood, when asked. The next washing, his 
shirt-fronts, collars and cuffs would be carried to his room 
innocent of starch or polish. To stormy protest and noisy 
wrath, she was alike callous. "Where was my kindlings 
and wood to build fire to bile starch and heat irons?" she 
would quietly ask. 

A c'^'rtain quaint philosophy was ever present with her, 
mingled with unshaken fatalism. "Why do you say 
'sorry?' " she would ask. "It had to be so." When the be- 
wailing victim of misfortune would reply, "If I had only 
knoum, just kno7tm." "There 'tis," she would answer tri- 
umphantly. "That's jes' what makes all the trouble in this 
worl'; we don't know." 

When deaih came to one, in whatever manner, her com- 
ment was always, " 'Twas their way to go. They'd got to 
the last mile-stun." She would entertain no plea of care- 
lessness or lemissness; brook to hear no untoward circum- 
stance. 'Twas "their way to go ; their time had come, their 
'bounds was fixed,' Job said so.'' This "kismet" she applied 
to every death. When her own daughter died, all expected 
to see it fail her, but not so ; firmly persuaded of her belief, 
she vowed, amid her fast-flowing tears, " 'Twas the 
Lord's will ; her time had come , no key could lock death 
out ; she was took from the evil tO' come," and thus she com- 
forted her poor, sore mother's heart. 

She was a keen observer, and one day, beholding one 
raised unexpectedly to a position whose early advantages 
had not fitted her for it, she remarked, "She don't fit her 



OLD NORTHERN SLAVES 95 

clo'es, nor liiey don't fit her. She grovved up without being 
pared down for 'em." 

She had duiracter, decision and inborn sincerity of pur- 
pose. After the loss of her husband and children she re- 
tired to a sm?.ll home of her own, where many friends testi- 
fied their appreciation of her worth. Here she expired and 
was gathered to her last repose. Her "time had come," 
that "set bounds" she so firmly believed none could pass, 
and she departed in peace. 

Som.ber enough were slavery's brightest days, and dark 
indeed were tlicse across which the shadow of the cruel 
master or mistress fell. 

On the outskirts of Warwick a venerable lady once point- 
ed out to the narrator a spot painfully associated with a 
msmory of her childhood. She was visiting at the house, 
and a poor slave mother stood ironing at a table in the next 
room, an ailing, fretful babe at her feet. Her mistress at 
length exclaimed : 

''Nance, take that young one over in the orchard and lay it 
under a tree, out of sight and hearing. I'm tired of its 
squalling " 

Without a word, the sad mother took up the sick babe and 
did as commanded. Coming back, she was ordered, now 
that the child was gone, to push through the ironing. Quiet- 
ly she resumed her employment, the tears rolling down her 
cheeks, and sprinkling the linen as she worked. 

When we recall that in those early times cattle ran loose 
over the country frequently, hogs especially, that snakes 
were plentiful, the heart stands still at the enormity of the 
biutality. 

A splendid specimen of black manhood was once owned 
by an old family in the neighborhood. He was large and 
magnificently built, full of the instinct of freedom, and had 
escaped from his master many times. After long search and 
rewards he was several times reclaimed. Once more he 



96 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

fled, and having been recovered was brought to a black- 
smith near the town by his master, who ordered a hea Vo- 
iron collar fitted to his neck, a shackle to his leg, and a chain 
to connect the two. The smith refused to fetter him, de- 
claring he would never so use any human being. Angered 
and baitied, the owner replied that if he did not do as he 
wished he would ruin his business, as people would not 
patroiiize a man who would not help an owner to retain his 
own j^roperty. The smith was a young man, with a rising 
family to support, and this wicked threat staggered him. He 
knew the cruel owner would keep good his shameful menace. 
The poor slave, seeing his dilemma, said : 

"Put them on, put them on, Mr. D , though if you do 

it will be the last man that will ever be chained in this shop." 

[Jnder the stress of circumstances the unwilling smith 
fettered the negro and he was borne away. Shortly after 
his shop was destroyed by fire in the dead of the night. 
vVlien this was related by the smith, he finished by remark- 
mg : 

"I knew well who burned my shop, but I never blamed 
him one bit." 

It would be interesting to know the subsequent fate of 
this slave, and if he lived to realize the joys of that freedom 
which he braved so much to attain. His name was Obi. 

The names of slaves were interesting. Some were high- 
sounding, grand and historical, many mellifluous and senti- 
mental, while others seemed bestowed in derision. Let us 
reflect on the sensation of going through life with such ap- 
peMations as these: 

Gif, Mink, Trump, Bat, Bal, Cof, Quash, Pomp, Yap, 
Tite, Go, Ouam, Dev and Flip, as a man, and Nan, Dib, File, 
Dide, Rit, Yud, Haanch, Teen, Cat, Pen, Chat, Hage and 
Jut, as a woman. 

Frequently a name was common in a family or neighbor- 
hood, and was used in connection with some personal pe- 



OLD NORTHERN SLAVES 97 

culiarity, as Old Haanch, Long Haanch, Fat Ilaanch, Little 
Haanch, Big Naiich, Lame Nauch, Yaller Nauch, and these 
adjectives stuck persistently to their objects through life. 

In some families slaves were made pets and playthings. 
Twin girls born on the Ellison place were notably favored 
in this respect. Their names were Rosy and Dilly. Mrs. 
Ellison took them with her on visits to her friends, and 
they would entertain the company by dancing, grimacing, 
feigned quarrels, in which they tumbled over each other 
and pulled wool vigorously, and in going through the mo- 
tions of carding, spinning, weaving, netting and so forth. 
Little Dill would fall down in such frightful fits as some- 
times to thoroughly scare their hostess, causing her mistress 
to scream with laughter. 

A very diminutive br^y named Prince was a favorite in 
this wise. He had an omniverous appetite for so small a 
youth, and was alwa3^s hungry. There really appeared to be 
no limit to Prince's capacity for storing awav food. While 
accompanying his mistress on visits, he would sometimes 
request a bite before the usual meal was prepared. For this 
he was chided, and positively forbidden to ever ask again. 
Soon after, while at a friend's, his mistress saw him screw- 
ing uneasily on his chair, a certain prognostic that Prince 
was growing hungry. The lady of the house at length ob- 
served him^ and make some remark. 

"Missy told me not never to ask for anything to eat 
again," he at length burst out, "an' Fm awful hungry, but 
I won't ask, no, not if I starve to death." 

Lilly was a slave possessed of a remarkably fine voice, in 
fact, it was wonderfully beautiful. At the old-fashioned 
camp-meetings, Lilly made the welkin ring with her clear, 
birdlike notes. vShe would sometimes get into a perfect 
ecstasy, carolling her favorite hynuis, and actually fall back- 
ward and partly unconscious in the rapture of singing them. 



98 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

It was one of the allurements of camp-meeting- to hear 
Lilly sing-, "The year of Jubilee," "I'm boun' for the Land of 
Canaan," "Oh, yes, 'tis a wonderful mystery," "Come, ye 
sinners, poor and needy," "He died for you and He died for 
me," "O glory! glory! halle-halle-lujah!" and the assembled 
congregation would listen almost spellbound, until Lilly 
"sung her head ofif," and rolled on the grass in an ecstatic 
fit. Once she lay so long in one of these trances that some 
one advised a sprinkling of water to rouse her. Opening 
her eyes and springing up with surprising energy, she ex- 
claimed : 

"No, you won't, and spile all my new yaller ribbons." 

Poor Lilly at last partially lost her reason, and when the 
wildness of a shattered mind inspired her melodies, they 
were said to be weird and startling in the extreme. 

Toby is recalled, a most comical and amusing figure. His 
oddities were legion. The soles of his feet were entirely 
covered with corns, which caused him to limp in a peculiarly 
painful manner, with a distressed face. His hands bore a 
crop of seedy warts. He always declared they we're 
"witched on him," and that "no airthly power" could re- 
m.ove them. The corns on his feet he considered were a 
"jedgment" sent upon him for "trompin' hoppy-toads" as a 
boy. 

"I squashed bushels," Toby would say, "an' now I'm 
under a jedgment foreber. The blood of them hoppy-toads 
rises out of the ground forevcr-n-ever-n-ever agin me." 

When the torment and stinging of the corns became unen- 
durable, Toby would scoop out a mud-bath for his feet by 
the brink of the pond, and there sit patiently for hours, 
burying his feet. Here he would weave rush cradles for the 
little girls' rag dolls, make willow-whistles, tell fortunes on 
daisies, fashion geese trussed for roasting from milkweed- 
pods, and tell stories of awful "sarpints, legged, spotted, 
wiggly, squirming" that once infested ponds, but were now 



OLD NORTHERN SLAVES 99 

departed forever. He was an adept in stringinj^ a sort of 
sing-song rhyme, of which fragments have been preserved. 

Toby loved to go to church, but ahvays asked for a pair 
of old gloves to wear, averring he wanted nobody to hold a 
"gridge" against his hands, on account of the disfiguring 
warts. A sympathizing physician once offered to rid Toby 
of this marring defect, but he firmly asserted that it could 
not be done. Wlien the doctor positively assured him that 
it could, Toby averred that "They was witched on, and 
would surely come right back," and the doctor had to yield 
the point. He carried a bone from a fowl in his pocket to 
keep off the toothache, saying things in nature always went 
contrary, and as hens had no teeth, the proximity of their 
bones was a sovereign specific in accordance with the con- 
trariness of "natur." 

Toby was a bachelor. No dusky, dark-eyed siren had 
ever beguiled him into that fatal noose, matrimony. Chil- 
dren, he averred, "was good zvhen they was good, when 
they wasn't, they wuz wuss than biles, an' give no peace till 
they was broke jes' like 'em." "Wimmen, mos'ly," he 
thought, did fairly, but the kind that liked ribbons and ear- 
drops were to be shunned. He had known some such, and 
they had brought desolation with the fluttering and tinkling 
of their ornaments. 

A son of the family was much charmed by a young lady 
who carried a high and finely poised head. 

"Don't hev her," warned Toby. "She wears the bridle 
herself now. When she gits you, she'll take it off and put it 
onto you." 

Toby would never cat an eel. He declared them the 
hybrid progeny of fish and snakes, and his horror of them 
was unbounded. He also had an avers^'on for "writin' 
women," having once served one. 

'V'^o' never wan' to look into their churns," said Tobv, 



loo UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

"for I see wrigglers on a writin' woman's churn-led once, 
and the rim runnin' away with 'em." 

As for their bread-trays, averred Toby, enough "slut- 
pennies" dried fast to 'em to choke a hoss to death. 

Such was Toby's judgment of these ever-to-be shunned 
females. He hobbled around on his corn-afflicted soles for 
many long years, and died peacefully, and was buried in a 
private family yard north of town. As children we long 
missed our kind friend as we played under the great willow 
by the pond, where he used to sit in the cool shadows, the 
first disciple of mud-baths known among us. 

Dear old Toby ! Let us hope that he is gone where corns 
are not, and where the kind, marred hands will no more be 
obliged to seek covering to shield them from the "gridge" he 
always seemed to dread. 

Pomp and Sukey were brother and sister. Never was 
Pomp happier than when his master named a splendid new 
English mastiff for him. His delight knew no bounds as he 
helped to provide shelter, bite and sup for the big, tawny 
fellow. In return for his kindness Pomp H always treated 
the old servitor with scant courtesy, muffled growls and sul- 
len glances, and in the bitterness of a v/ounded spirit, Pomp 
declared "not for no livin' man would he ever have his name 
giv' to ary dog agin, an' be snapped an' growled at to all 
etarnity for it, no, not for ary dog that ever stood on legs." 

Neither Pomp or Sukey were ever married. Their affec- 
tion for each other was unbounded. As Pomp waxed old, 
he grew quite disinclined for active labor, and "chored" 
about friendly homesteads, earning but little, but Sukey 
toiled most faithfully and contributed to his comfort, in all 
fond sisterly ways. When his toes sought the outside of his 
shoes her little hoard was drawn upon, and a new pair cov- 
ered them, and so all his needs were supplied by his watch- 
ful and ever-ready sister. 

Sukev, as before mentioned, was single. From a stout 



OLD NORTHERN SLAVES loi 

pole laid across two crotchcd sticks, driven in the ground 
by tlie creek, hung her large brass kettle, and with a bright, 
businesslike fire burning beneath it, in this improvised 
laundry she earned many good dollars, iier little cot stood 
not far away, and here, in her youth, she dwelt with 
widowed mother and only brother, antl diligently pursued 
her lowly avocation. When her day's work was completed, 
she spent the evening clear-starcliing and ironmg, and had 
the honor of "doing" rufiled shirts and funeral bands for the 
country clergy. The doing of these was a solemn and mo- 
mentous occasion, in which Sukey's whole heart Vv'qnt out 
to her work, so there was at such times little left for a sable 
suitor who now and then humbly scraped his feet at her door. 

One evening Sukey had clear-starched and ironed her 
week's work and lain it in immaculate whiteness on the 
splint-bottomed chair, covered with a long crape veil to keep 
oil marauding flies. Departing then with her mother to 
make a friendly call after the labors of the day, the lonely 
cot was dark and still when Boham, the lover, stole up. He 
could not bear to go away without one glimpse of his be- 
loved's shining face, so, lifting the latch and finding a seat, 
he ensconsed himself thereon, and soon, in the stillness of 
the summer night, fell asleep. 

At length Sukey and her mother appeared, and uncovering 
the fire, lighted the tallow dip, when lo ! their horrified eyes 
fell on the waiting lover, sound asleep on the week's work, 
all crushed, ruined, under his ponderous avoirdupois. A 
kettle of starch, left over from her work, stood on the table. 
Grabbing the luckless lover by the wool, she seized handful 
after handful and plastered it therein, rubbing vigorously, 
while, half-awake, stunned, amazed, he howled for mercy, 
unconscious of his offence, and thinking Sukey had surely 
gone mad. 

Poor girl i It was the end of the only love dream of her 
life. Weary and panting, she at length let go, a snow-capped 



I02 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

darky fled wildly out into the night, and sought the banks 
of the rushing creek, and until the still small hours, hent 
above the waters, clawing, tearing at his beplastered wool, 
rubbing, sousing, tousleing, in mad endeavors to free it 
from Sukey's starching. When his best was done, poor 
Boham fared home, and Sukey and he were strangers for- 
ever. 

"How did I know," he said, pathetically, "all Sukey's 
clo'es was kivered on dat cheer?" 

Sukey remained in single blessedness through life. Boham 
was never replaced by another claimant for her toil-worn, 
dusky hand. She devoted herself to her fond old mother 
until her death, and thereafter transferred her faithful af- 
fection to slow and rather stupid Pomp. He died first, and 
til en she removed to Goshen, to be near friends of her own 
color, where she was finally gathered to tlie great majority. 

A quaint, trim figure, of slender and elastic build, and 
carrying herself with a grace and airiness unusual, she is 
remembered well among the little cluster of ex-slaves who 
were wont to gather around our hearthstone. She never 
forgave poor Boham, whether for the wreck of her laundry- 
ing, or the overthrow of her marital prosi)ects, could not be 
ascertained. 

One bleak, wintry day, Sukey, then quite aged, came to 
see our mother. She was an especial favorite in the house- 
hold, and begged that the new-born babe be named for his 
grandfather, Benjamin. She repeated often, "Sech a good 
n^an, and sech a purty, purty Bible name." When told that 
the little boy was named for his great-grandfather, she ex- 
claimed reproachfully : 

"Now, see, to skip yo' own daddy." 
Sukey never came again ; her death followed soon after. 
Little children with a child's inborn love of stories, we 
never wearied of hearing our grandmother tell of old Tune, 
an ex-slave of many quaint characteristics. He was born 



OLD NORTHERN SLAVEvS 103 

in the Tunison family, from wliich circumstance he inherited 
his name, at the foot of old Sugar Loaf Mountain, a peak of 
that peculiar shape which rears its summit eight hundred 
feet into the clear air of Orange County, and is one of the 
most striking of the many beautiful landmarks of that sec- 
tion. 

Here in his early youth Tune disported himself after ob- 
taining his freedom in his own fashion, catching rattle- 
snakes and skunks, and extracting the oils therefrom at an 
old disused forge in a ruined blacksmith's shop near his 
home. These he sold to rheumatics and paralytics, and my 
grandmother declared they had potent efficacy in limbering 
up the stiff-jointed and palsied. 

Prowling the rock-ribbed mountain one day for rattlers. 
Tune discovered one coiled in the crevice of a rock. It 
was his custom to seize them by the tip of the tail, to give 
them a stunning slat against a tree trunk or rock, and then 
bag them. But alas ! the wary snake was too alert for its 
captor. As Tune crept softly up and insinuated his long 
lithe fingers in the crevice toward the temptingly visible 
tail, it struck the dark, trespassing hand and inserted its 
fangs with wrathful venom. With wild screams of fright 
uud pain Tune shook off the reptile and ran with mad leaps 
down the mountain side to the door of old Clans, an Indian 
doctor famous for his cures of snake bites. He ministered 
skilfully to stricken Tune and succeeded in saving his life, 
although he was very near death. From that day he relin- 
quished snake-catching and his thriving business in healing 
oils, evincing an unbounded horror of any reptile, and took 
up the avocation of Chimney Burner in Chief to the rural 
population of the section. 

Never was one more eminently fitted by kindly Dame 
Nature for a chosen life work. Tall, long-armed, long- 
heeled, quick as a cat and supple as the snakes he had for- 
sworn, Tune's new business of Chimney Burner for the conn- 



I04 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

try hamlets yielded him many bright shillings and plenteous 
meals. The chimneys in the isolated farmhouses, where 
wood was the only fuel, became periodically clogged with 
soot, and as a chimney sweep with his implements was then 
unknown, the only method of cleaning was to burn them out. 
This was a matter of some skill and anxiety and one the 
work-stiffened old farmers often demurred at, as it frequent- 
ly required a quick clambering to the roof of the home and 
adjacent buildings to quench the sparks drifting here and 
there. So after Tune took up the occupation he became a 
real necessity and found business plenty, especially in spring 
and fall. 

What joy to the young members of the household when 
Tune presented himself at the kitchen door, and, bowing 
low, scraping and pulling his grizzled foretop, inquired : 
"Chimblys wan' bu'nin' out?" When informed that they 
did, an engagement would be made and early in the morn- 
ing Tune would make his appearance. Nimble as the squir- 
rels chattering in the old trees, he proceeded to business. 
Filling every pot, pan, pail and pitcher with water and plac- 
ing the long ladder securely against the eaves, he would carry 
them all to the roof, where they were safely deposited. Tune 
asserting with pride that he never spilt a drop going up. 
"Can' hev too much water on the ruf through the bu'nin' 
out," he would aver. 

This done. Tune would hie him to the wood-pile and carry 
in several armfuls of green logs. Throwing them on the 
hearth he would improvise a rustic fender all about the fire- 
place to prevent the burning cinders from rolling out over 
the bare sanded floor, for these were not the days of linole- ' j 
ums and oil-cloths. Now, all being in readiness. Tune's 
long feet made quick tracks to the barn, where he pulled from 
the mows the very fullest and longest sheaf of rye straw. 
Bringing it in, he would rake the fireplace clean and with re- 
doubled brandishings of his long arms thrust it far up the 



OLD NORTHERN SLAVES 105 

yawning black throat of the chimney. "Now, nothin' want- 
in' but a shubbel o' coals," Tune would comment, and with 
a swoop these were added and the straw ignited. 

How the watching group of children thrilled and trembled 
may be imagined, as the shooting flames went roaring and 
thundering up the long tunnel, fairly shaking the homestead 
on its sturdy foundation ! Up, up, the dense black coils of 
smoke rolled in somber rings against the sky, and the rent 
banners of flames wavered in the breeze. With what won- 
derful contortions Tune would scramble to the roof time 
and again to see that no spark had fastened there, occasion- 
ally whispering in sepulchral accents with lugubrious face 
that he "jes' hove up in time to save the house — ruf afire in 
forty places," meantime rolling the whites of his great eyes 
till naught of their color was visible, and curling down his 
immense under lip aside at some of the elders of the family, 
as the children stood aghast at the awful possibility he had 
averted. 

Then, when the rumbling had ceased and the flames died 
down, most entrancing of all it must have been to see the 
glowing incrustations of fiery soot and cinders come chasing 
each other down the white-hot chimney as if in madcap play, 
dropping to the hearth to whisper their fiery secrets against 
the grim barriers of smoking green logs. Crepitating, mur- 
muring, at last they died away in ashen pallor and lay chilled 
on the hearth wont to be so bright. 

How the very young of the home paled with foreboding 
when Tune would sometimes assert he "know'd ole Cinder 
Claws was up the chimbly when the fire started, and r'ally 
believed he had singed his heels !" Mournful visions of caps 
unfilled and small yarn stockings hanging limp at the fire- 
place on Christmas morn would flit across their fancy, as 
they sadly pictured Santa Claus detained at home nursing 
his blistered heels. With a tremendous blubbering of his 
big lip and peeling of his eye. Tune would admonish "not to 



io6 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

be skeert, fur he see Cinder Claws scoot over the ruf jes' 
as the fire started, an' heerd him holler back he had been 
busy makin' doughnut babies with raisin eyes for the Dutch 
chirern down in Sussex." 

After all w^as over, the household utensils brought from 
the roof, ladder carried to the barn, the smoking green logs 
cooling in the back yard, Tune would replace the andirons, 
build a fresh crackling fire and enjoy a hearty dinner beside 
it from the kind hands of great-grandmother. As he toast- 
ed his long heels by the newly built fire, lie would often 
amuse the little ones scattered about the jamb with stories 
which invariably smacked of his vocation. 

One was of a "very stingy fam'ly, too clus to hev their 
chimblys bu'ned out, an' they got suttier an' suttier an' cin- 
dier an' cindier, until one day the awful mess took fire and 
made such a ter'ble heat the chimblys all busted to onct, an' 
the bricks flew out an' killed all the fambly an' bu'nt the hull 
house to the groun'." Tune would always wind up this 
story by cautioning the group of little ones to see that the 
parents frequently employed his valuable services, lest like 
calamity befall them. 

Another story Tune was fond of relating, as he quaffed 
mug after mug of simmering spiced cider, was of "a fambly 
shif 'less an' slack to the last degree ; who never had their 
chimblys bu'ned out from year's end to year's end." The 
chimneys of this ne'er-do-weel household one fateful night 
also took fire, "an' bu'ned an' bu'ned, but did not bust. Jes' 
bu'ned on an' never went out," Tune would solemnly assert, 
"an' they roared on an' no one could squench 'em; an' the 
roarin' made 'em all stun deef, an' the smoke an' sparks flew 
out inter their eyes, an' the baby was sot afire in the cradle 
an' the dinners was burnt, an' all because Tune was not sent 
for." 

When little Jonah, ever of an investigating and exploring 
nature, anxiously inquired where this building in eternal 



OLD NORTHERN SLAVES 107 

conflagration was located, with hidden puipose of some time 
running- away to find it, our grandmother declared he was. 
always informed by Tune that it was "so fur away his feet 
would be worn to nubs afore he ever found it," so our small 
great-uncle never dared to start. 

As Tune worked cheerily at the chimneys, he sang many 
songs, of which grandmother regretted she could recall but 
one. This ran : 

House a-burnin', house a-buniin', 

Jump up, jump up, 
Fire a-gittin' madder, madder, 
Run for water, run for ladder. 

So far as can be ascertained, and from all that is known, 
the Northern slaves did not possess the fanciful jingle of 
rhyme which gave so quaint an attraction to their Southern 
brethren. They seem to have had but few in the locality 
with which we have to deal. They sang hymns far more. 
One song is recalled, of which but a single verse is remem- 
bered. It was called "Jim-a-long-a-Josey," and was com- 
posed by a white musician. A shiftless negro, named Old 
Jake, used to sing it at raisings, haying frolics and at high 
noon at the country school-houses, accompanying the lines 
with a hilarious double-shuffle dance. The pupils rewarded 
Jake with such fragments from dinner-pails and baskets as 
could be spared, and he was a frequent visitor. 

Jake's weakness was mince-pie, and in return for a few 
bites of this favorite delectable he would scrape his heels be- 
fore an admiring crowd the whole noontide. The lines that 
linger in memory run thus : 

The bullfrog came from the bottom of the spring. 

He had such a cohl he couldn't sing. 

He tied his tail to a hickory stump. 

And rared and kicked but he couldn't make a jump. 

Hi git along, Jim-a-long-a-Josey, 
Hi git along, Jim-a-long-a-Joe. 

{Many times repealed.') 



io8 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

Jake's entertainments at the various seats of learning scat- 
tered about on the country hillsides at length terminated un- 
fortunately. A pupil one day brought with her to school a 
cousin from the city. The littlei visitor was sitting in the 
play-house on the green in front of the door when Jake ap- 
peared upon the scene, and began his song and dance. When 
he arrived at the frantic struggles of the bullfrog to execute 
the jump, which he was fated never to accomplish, Jake's 
contortions always became vigorous, and this particular day 
must have been unusually exciting, for, on beholding them, 
the small visitor sat appalled for a moment, and then fell 
into a fit of shrieking fright, which was in no wise mitigated 
by poor old Jake's endeavors to pacify her, and his assur- 
ances that he wouldn't hurt her for "the best cow that ever 
wore a tail." The teacher appearing, Jake was banished, 
and no doubt sadly missed his fees of mince-pie, doughnuts ; 
and other goodies. Another jingle which I recall, and have ■ 
rhymed was : 

THE HIGH-HOLE AND THE PHEBE-BIRDIE. 

The high-hole looked from the holler oak tree 

At the phebe-bird, an' he says, says he, 
"Little yaller gal, will yo' marry me?" 
" An' hve in a hole ?" says the little phebe-e. 
" No, no, I won't, sir, no sir-e-e, 

I'll stay an' be a phebe birdie-e-e-e." 

TTie high-hole snap his bill and say, 
" Little yaller gal, now yo' go 'way, 
The teeter-tail she live by the brook, 
She primp an' tilt an' give me a look, 
What do I care for a phebe-bird-e-e-e 
When a teeter-tail she smile at me." 

Then the phebe-bird she laugh to kill, 
An' say "01' high-hole, you be still, 
Teeter-tail she marry last night, 
An' now her name it Mis' Bob White." 
Then the high-hole bump his head on a tree. 
An' fall down dead for the little phebe-e-e. 

The following used to be sung by Anne Boham, long at 



OLD NORTHERN SLAVES 109 

service in one of the old families, bond and free. A frag- 
i ment only is remembered, though there were many verses : 

There was a frog lived in the rill, 

Tel lay, tel link, tel _lo ! 
He courted a mouse lived in the mill, 

Tel lay, tel link, tel lo ! 
The frog he went to mouse's hole, 

Tel lay, tel link, tel lo! 
And Mistress Mouse was taking toll, 

Tel lay, tel link, tel lo ! 

The pollywog, or pollywoggle, was a favorite character in 
this lore. Many little ditties are recalled, in which this small 
denizen of the ponds and fens figured. This, redressed, was 
Toby's favorite : 

The pollywog lived in the mill-pond flume. 
So lonesome for she lose her groom ; 
The hoppy-toad he hear her sigh, 
An' he roll way up the white his eye. 
Says he, "I can hop an' jump sky-high, 
I'll marry Misses Pollywog if I die, 
Hippity, hoppety, blink your eye, 
Tumblecome tarry, jump high sky!" 

She stuck a posy in her cap, 

An' opened the door for Floppy's rap, 

An' there he was all in his best. 

With a beautiful yaller satin vest. 

He laid his hand upon his hip, 

She put her finger to her lip, 

An' curcheyed pretty as ever you see. 

An' said, "Come in, do, Mr. Hoppee-e." 

The wedding was the very next night, 
Mis' Polly Wog was dressed in white, 
An' Mr. Frog in bottle green, 
'Twas the finest wedding ever seen ; 
They supped on s'pawn and danced till day, 
Lickity brindle, larrupy lay ! 
Turn keely over, blink yo'r eye, 
Hippity, hoppety, jump sky high!" 

A fanciful jingle, which seemed to cover all things flying, 
creeping or running, used to be repeated among the children 
of the family. It was best known to a soldier brother, whose 
dust mineles with the clods of Chancellorsville. A few of 



no UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

the lines are recalled, but they stretched out to great length.^ 
Toby was the ex-slave from whom they were gathered: 



I 



Old Rat dip his tail in cream, 
Let de young ones lick it clean ; 
Weasel in de chicken-coop, 
Very meanest kin' o' snoop ; 
Weevil fin' it very sweet, 
'Way down in de bin o' wheat; 
Wagtail settin' on a log, 
Get so scairt at Daddy Frog; 
Little Mis' Tadpole run and hide 
When Mr. Pike stretch he mout' wide; 
Hang bird on de wilier limb, 
Pollywog round de teasel swim ; 
Tumblebug he roll he load 
Up de hill an' down de road ; 
Woodchuck never make a sound, 
Dig a hide-hole in de ground ; 
Old Mudsucker call out, "Hush ! 
Axe a-choppin' en de brush" ; 
Chipmunk chatter, chatter, chatter, 
Big Brown Thrasher flop and clatter; 
Young Mis' Rat she spy a trap, 
Never know it go off, snap ! 
Little old woman en de tree 
Pull her hood so she can see; 
Ground bird build her little nest, 
In de mud as she like best. 
Where de ol' cow set her huff 
Make a hole jest big enough. 

(And so on.) 

The little old woman in the tree is the hawk-moth, its 
curious puckered face bearing a fanciful resemblance to an ^ 
old woman's in a hood. 

An aged ex-slave, long living in our family, used to sing: 
a song commencing: 

To-morrow will be holiday. 
The niggers then will dance and play, 
No more work nor home to stay. 
For all will have a holiday. 

Sing and dance and run away. 
To-morrow will be holiday. 

Holiday she invariably rendered "hollowday." She sang 
many ditties, among them : 



OLD NORTHERN SLAVES in 

Black hands make white money, 
Stay home, bees, lay np honey. 
The still sow drinks the swill, 
Let the old horse have his will. 

It is a regret not to have known thcni in their early youth, 
when gay and Hght of heart and foot, the .sunshine, song 
and merriment of their natures iiad not been repressed by 
years of sorrow, toil and change. The Northern slaves were 
keen observers. They congregated more rarely with their 
fellows than their Southern brethren, as their homes were 
usually in the families of their masters. Both loved hymns, 
spiritual songs and ringing music that told of a happy land 
where toil and pain were not; also sad, mournful melodies 
which they breathed forth with infinite pathos. 

"I sink, I sink, I can't liold out no more," rendered in a 
low, dirge-like tone, was absolutely blood-chilling. 



And 



And 



Down in the grave, down in the grave, 
Where we all got to go, 
Down low, down low. 

Seek, seek, seek and never, never find. 
Till the poor soul lost and gone; 

Seeking, seeking, seeking. 
Never, never find. 

Lord, lay me low and keep me low, 
Lest from out thy ways I go. 



as sung in their prayer meetings in their lowl}^ homes or at 
camp meetings in the dim, shadowy woods were a few of 
these sad strains familiar to my youth, and I well remember 
their unutterably pathetic and calamitous expression. 

Whatever presented a vivid word picture was the delight 
of the negro soul, and he loved to sing of "The Year of Jubi- 
lee," "The Chariot of Fire," "Tl^e Happy Land," of "Pearly 
Gates," and "Golden Harps," of "Jerusalem, Happy Home," 
of the apostles, prophets and sainted ones gone before. 

And so let us take leave of the kind sable friends, the 
scattered memories of whose simple toilsome lives have been 



112 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

gathered in these pages. Not one is recalled who was not 
honest, faithful, loyal, loving and most interesting. The 
depth of affection in their natures was remarkable. To the 
latest days of their lives they clung with fond devotion to 
those whose fathers had once owned their flesh and blood — 
Heaven forgive tliem — and among all its good gifts, let us 
be most thankful for liberty for them, and that they died 
free. 



V 
The Bygone Doctor 



V 




The Bygone Doctor 

URING the rcig-n of good Queen Anne politics 
bore so fierce a Whig and Tory aspect that it 
extended to the physicians employed. Garth, 
the author of the Dispensary, reigned as healer 
of the Whig party, while Arbuthnot ministered 
to the Tory. To Garth, Sir Richard Steele paid the high 
compliment of declaring that "his professional generosity 
was exceeded by none living.*' Of Arbuthnot, Pope (life- 
long invalid) wrote: 

Friend to my life, which did not you prolong, 
The world had wanted many an idle song. 

What a planet ours would be if it were filled with such 
doctors as poor, tender-hearted Ollie Goldsmith, who took 
the guineas received for his sweet, immortal verse and gave 
them to his half-starved patients as prescriptions, declaring 
they took them joyfully, and made no wry faces! What 
head grown white in our home town but remembers the 
kind, sympathetic faces of Doctors Stanley, Coe, Lynn, 
Herron, Reynolds, Stevens and their successors, as they 
jogged in their close-fitting sulkeys over hill and dell, 
bumped up and down mountain and mired in rutted level 
through spring thaws and autumnal washouts. Among the 
memories of my childhood, I recall being told by an old ex- 
slave employed in the family that after doctors were made 
to have a "paper" to doctor by, they became a very dan- 
gerous class. Serena declared that now they "couldn't even 



ii6 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

bleed a kitten in a fit" without showing their "paper," and 
that these gruesome healers "robbed graves for bodies to 
chop up, hacked poor critters open to see inside of 'em, and 
had skelentons all over their houses." Intense was my 
horror of this awful menace that had dawned on afflicted 
humanity and I longed to have lived in the day when doc- 
tors were not obliged to have "papers," when one might 
rest undisturbed in the quiet old churchyard, fertilizing the 
daisies and buttercups, and not in life be surreptitiously 
opened like Bluebeard's closet to disclose awful hidden hor- 
rors ; also call for the doctor without rattling down a shower 
of bones as the knocker resounded. It is well authenticated 
that our ancestors lived to hale and hearty old age, raised 
houses full of healthy children, often without one break in 
the proverbial family stairs ; then why not skill and intelli- 
gence in the ministrations of the old-time healer? Did 
he or did he not always have his "papers"? I cannot 
find out. Perhaps he sprang like Minerva in the Golden 
Age in the fullness of wisdom. I have traced him back to 
a century and a half agone, and have here given him just 
as he has been handed down to me. Long, long ago — 

He looked around 
And chose his ground, 
And took his sleep. 

Kind Heaven rest his soul ! He thought he was doing his 

very best. Who can do more ? 

The first herb healer of whom I can find any trace in 

ancient Warwick filled the dual capacity of teacher in the 

district log schoolhouse and herb doctor in his hours of 

leisure. Like Philip Anthony of old — 

A learned man was he ; 

In 'rithmetic he'd gone as far 
As the Rule of Double Three. 
He'd studied physic, too, 

And he was boarded round, 
He cured coughs, colds and phthysic, too, 

With roots dug from the ground. 



THE BYGONE DOCTOR 117 

For some years he flourished, teaching and heahng, then 
disappeared and was seen no more, leaving tlie birch to rest 
on the time-worn desk, and a fragrant memory of aromatic 
"composition tea," mandrake pills and hemlock sweats to 
embalm his memory. He was a dentist also, and extracted 
teeth for his little school as well as the whole countryside ; a 
surgeon setting such broken bones as befell the community, 
and if any more useful individual ever happed upon our 
town, his memory has perished. 

That the olden regular physician bled profusely, and 
made the lancet's point and the compounds of the 
"sprightly metal" the "rock of refuge," none may deny, 
and when — 

Life's o'erspent lamp and Time's bewasted light 
Became extinct with age and endless night, 

his good steed rested in the stall, the saddle-bags were hung 
in the garret, and his patients thought, just as we do now, 
they "couldn't live Vv'ithout their doctor." But thoughtful 
ones stood by dying beds, and heard the sufferers cry for 
water, beg, pray, with fevered lips, for one life-giving drop, 
saw them denied until death closed the scene ; and they said 
no more mercury, and the botanic physician arose to take a 
permanent place in early medical circles. 

The bark and fruit of the wild cherry was used as a 
strengthening medicine, the green of the elder for a healing 
salve, the sumac as a gargle for sore throats, the yellow dock 
as a blood purifier, the slippery elm and mullein in dropsy, 
kidney troubles and consumption. The stramonium was 
considered invaluable. An ointment of the leaves was kept 
in every home for ulcers, rheumatism and eruptions. Clumps 
of hyssop, sage, lavender, rue, balm, motherwort were found 
in every garden, and the strings of red peppers glinting in 
the sunshine at pantry and kitchen windows were always 
called on in sudden cold, attacks of intestinal disturbance 
and sore throat. Skullcap was used in St. Vitus's dance and 



ii8 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

disorders of the nerves, the prickly pear as a stimulant, also 
for liver derangements and rheumatism. A salve from it 
was popular in scrofula and ulcers. Snakeroot was most 
useful as a gargle for putrid sore throat, which twice pre- 
vailed severely in the early days of the settlement. A decoc- 
tion of the wild indigo was considered invaluable as an 
antiseptic, and beneficial in gangrene and bed sores. Poke- 
berries in old applejack were freely given in rheumatic 
troubles, and the root, dried and powdered, was used as an 
emetic. The common blueflag was called herb calomel and 
was to bestir a sluggish liver. Wintergreen and Prince's 
pine were largely given in kidney, rheumatic and dropsical 
ailments. No herb was held of more value than the blood- 
root. It was used for dyspepsia, also for whoopingcough 
and labored breathing. A wash of the plant was applied in 
skin diseases. The deadly nightshade was administered in 
palsy, convulsions and nervous troubles. Witch-hazel was 
kept in every home for hemorrhage, dysentery and canker 
sore mouth. Wormwood was a iiever-failitig remedy for 
bruises, sprains and inflammation ; it was also a tonic. 

Almost every home-keeper, each recurring summer and 
autumn, gathered and most carefully dried spearmint, pep- 
permint, catnip, elder-blossom, balsam, pennyroyal, burdock 
and dandelion for family use through the winter months. 
Baby, that important young autocrat of the household, was 
not expected to exist without regularly administered doses 
of catnip tea. Various liniments — of turpentine, camphor 
and healing herbs — were made and hoarded against a day of 
wounds, sores and bruises. The drug store was unknown, 
the general store keeping a corner for Peruvian bark, 
rhubarb, castor oil, paregoric, sulphur, peppermint, God- 
frey's cordial, elixir of opium, Haarlem oil and opodeldoc. 
The selling of drugs was free and unrestricted. When sick- 
ness entered a home and the kind old granny or auntie came 
with her bag of simples, she was made welcome, listened to 



M 



THE BYGONE DOCTOR 119 

with deference and her time-honored remedies duly admin- 
istered. None was so wise in his day and generation as 
to scoff at lier or disdain her homely cure-alls. Neighbor 
nursed neighbor with sympathy and kindly interest, and 
when life had fled, "sat up," or "watched/' with the silent 
form till the funeral day saw it borne to its last long home. 
This sad day frecjuently very closely followed the death, as 
no means of preserving "the loved and lost" were in use. 
The old horrifying tales of burials alive could easily have 
had foundation in these times, when in sudden death the 
unfortunate, especially if of full habit, was hurried quickly 
to the tomb. It was customary, and considered proper — 

Before decay's eflfacing fingers 

Had swept the lines where beauty lingers. 

The old-fashioned mother, save in very exceptional cases, 
nursed her own infant. It was no uncommon thing to see 
families of eight, ten or twelve, even more, and not one 
break in the line. One mother and her two daughters had 
forty-three children, who all grew to man's and woman's 
estate but one. Tacitus, the Roman liistorian, attributed 
the degeneracy of Rome, in part, to the habit that had crept 
in of mothers given over to luxury abandoning the care of 
their infants to poor Grecians and ignorant menials, and, on 
looking back, we find when the old-time matron nursed and 
cared for her own babe, the percentage of deaths was small. 

The ancient custom of visiting the sick was most perni- 
cious. No affront was regarded as more flagrant than to 
deny the visitor access tO' the sickroom. No matter how ill, 
nervous, weary or low the patient, the caller was never ex- 
cluded. An aged lady was wont to tell that, during the very 
serious illness of her mother and brother with a dangerous 
fever, twenty-two persons called one Sabbath afternoon, 
eleven of whom remained to tea. During the severe strain 
and cares of illness, the usually plenteous larder had run 



I20 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

low, and notwithstanding it was hot weather, a large fire 
had to be kindled, biscuit baked, and other preparations made 
for the visiting sympathizers. Tliis seems almost incredible, 
but it is absolute truth. Diseases were generally considered 
"a visitation of God," but little fear was felt of infection, 
and subjects of the most fatal and malignant types were 
publicly buried, frequently causing a wide spreading of the 
trouble. None can compute the damage done by crowding 
the room of the afflicted patient, the kindly meant but ill- 
timed condolence, the suppressed whispering and lugubrious 
faces. 

Among the old customs, now almost obsolete, was that of 
tolling the bell for every death. Having its origin in rank- 
est superstition, it was most pernicious in its effect on the 
sick and dying. But here is an exception. A lady, lying 
very ill with fever and at the crisis of the disease, was 
watched with anxious solicitude by an affectionate daughter. 
After an unusually restless and weary night, about nine in 
the morning, the patient sank into a sweet sleep. Gratefully 
the tender daughter noted the refreshing rest steal over her 
mother, when, all at once, the old church bell near their 
home pealed out preparatory to the tolling of the dismal 
death knell, which soon commenced its mournful tones. In 
the center of the room the startled watcher listened appre- 
hensively to the depressing clangor. It tolled and tolled, 
as only a vigorous old church bell, pulled by strong arms, 
can ring the demise of a venerable inhabitant. Through 
the sixties with brazen lungs, into the seventies with undi- 
minished volume, it opened bravely on the eighties, until at 
last the almost frantic daughter burst forth, "Lord have 
mercy on us ! Is Moses dead ?" 

The mother, who awakened at the first peal, had lain 
with half-closed eyes surveying the scene, at this ebullition 
burst into a fit of laughter, which happily left no evil effects. 



THE BYGONE DOCTOR 121 

and she was wont to relate the incident with nuich amuse- 
ment ever after. 

A fear of cold from fresh air, bathing- or change of linen 
prevailed in early days. Patients in fever were shut closely 
in stifling rooms, scarcely a breath of air was allowed to 
enter by door or window, and a change of linen for patient 
or bed was considered by some almost certain death. What 
must have been the sufferings of the afflicted the imagination 
vainly conjectures, as in addition to these horrors, owing to 
the use of mercury, in almost all illness by certain practi- 
tioners water was strictly prohibited. 

Many superstitions prevailed in regard to the curing of 
ague and fever. One was for the sufferer to run until in a 
profuse perspiration, and then plunge into a cold stream. 
Another, while the fit was on, to go to the top of the house 
and crawl headlong down each pair of stairs to the bottom, 
this several times. A young lady, at the suggestion of an 
ignorant but kindly meaning neighbor, did this while suf- 
fering severely from chills, and sustained an internal injury 
which left her ever after a livid greenish yellow, which was 
never removed. This lady's feat not only ruined a once 
lovely complexion, but nearly cost her life. 

An old but more sensible cure, largely prevailing, was to 
shape a waistcoat of coarse linen, make two exactly alike, 
dip them in white wine repeatedly and dry ; then, stretching 
them carefully out, powdered Peruvian bark was placed be- 
tween, and they were quilted together. This was placed 
upon the patient and was said to have a most happy effect 
by absorption. 

As to the amount of blood our ancestors stoically stood to 
lose in some acute diseases imagination palls. A physician 
of one hundred and twelve years ago drew fourteen ounces 
at a first bleeding, nine ounces twenty-four hours after, and 
then the complaint, pleurisy, continuing painful, a third and 
fourth bleeding were undergone. Many traditions of blood 



122 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

letting have been handed down. Among these a lady de- 
clares she was called upon, when a child of eight, to hold the 
bowl for the operation on her mother. While so doing, she 
became frightened and demurred. "Stand up to it, little 
girl," said the doctor, cheerfully, "you'll have to do it aU 
your life, probably." While the arm was bared her mother 
remarked, "This is nine times on this arm, doctor." 

In the commencement of the eighteenth century, and dur- 
ing the decline of the seventeenth, the "fruit cure" for lung 
diseases was generally heard of. Marvellous cures of con- 
sumption from rigidly adhering to a diet of red and white 
currants, with bread and very spare regimen, were made 
known. Old residents went afar and procured the white 
currant, and these venerable bushes were long to be found in 
old gardens. The acid of these fruits was supposed to pro- 
mote a gentle perspiration and to mildly and insensibly sweat 
out the disease. 

Before vaccination was known the terrors of smallpox 
were mitigated by the subject rigidly dieting for two or 
three weeks, abstaining from all oily or heating foods, and 
then going to some one with the disease and deliberately ex- 
posing himself and contracting it. Hop tea and warm whey 
were then freely given to throw the eruption "from the 
heart" and a salve of elder-blossoms was applied. A 'lady 
who underwent this experience in 1795 said that she had it 
lightly, suffered but little, and knew many children who 
ventured the same with no evil result and a lasting immunity 
from the horrors of disfigurement by the dread disease. At 
this date, though inoculation was known in Europe long, it 
had made but little progress in the New World ; whether it 
had really been much practised in our hamlets is doubtful. 
At all events, the inhabitants favored the good old way of 
dieting and taking the disease bv voluntary contact; then, 
with prudence and care, they suffered but little. After vac 
cination was freely introduced, many looked upon it with 



THE BYGONE DOCTOR 123 

strong disfavor. One reason for this was declared to be 
"the fear that the child might die, and they be blamed," and 
thus become a prey to unavailing regret. 

An old and favorite remedy for a cough was to wear a 
plaster of Burgundy pitch between the shoulder-blades. It 
was said to be of great benefit. Friar's Balsam and Jesuit's 
Drops were two old remedies for cough, greatly prized. 
Balsam of Peru was said, with benzoin, to enter largely into 
their composition. 

The amount of mercury given in some forms of intestinal 
disease baflies the telling. A physician of high repute rec- 
ommended in severe cases giving to the extent of a pound, 
in broken doses, but gravely declared this should not be ex- 
ceeded. Should this awful quantity defeat its own intention, 
it was recommended to "hold the patient up by the heels and 
let it be discharged by the mouth." Incredible as this may 
seem, it is truth, pure and simple, and is vouched for by a 
medical work in my possession. 

Dysentery caused painful sickness and many deaths in the 
summer and autumn of 1822. An ancient remedy for this 
distressing illness, not only used m families, but ordered by 
physicians of the day, was to take a sheep's head and feet, 
with the wool on them, burn it off on a hot ploughshare, and 
then boil until the broth was a jelly. This was lightly salted 
and flavored with cinnamon. It was said that patients given 
over to die were perfectly cured by this broth. Clear whey 
was also freely used, especially for children. Wild cherries 
were much depended on, and were considered almost a spe- 
cific. They were made into syrup, and sometimes the juice 
was expressed and preserved in a form called "cherry- 
bounce." A decoction of bugle-weed was also thought to 
be a specific. 

Mineral waters were unknown in the primitive days of the 
town. Although in Europe the Bath, Bristol, Epsom, Nevil 
Holt, Scarborough and Clieltenham were in vogue, onlv oc- 



124 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

casionally did some traveler tell of their wondrous efficacy in 
our midst. Of these last waters a departed parent is de- 
clared to have caused an epitaph to be engraved upon his 
family tombstone, telling a sympathizing world that — 

Here lies me and my three daughters 
A-died o' drinking o' Chekenh'am waters ; 
If we'd a-stuck to Epsom's salts 
We wouldn't 'a' been in these here vaults. 

What a blow to the chalybeate ! and how saline old Epsom 
must have held up its head after this memorial was erected ! 

True, people made their own sulphur-water, tar-water, 
limewater, tincture of hand-wrought horse-shoe nails, etc., 
and derived great benefit therefrom. 

After many days the hearts of invalids were made glad 
with mineral springs of their very own, about three miles 
from Goshen, in old Orange, the Cheechunk Springs. Baths 
were kept for visitors. They were advertised as a delightfulll 
retreat for the invalid, and a pleasure-ground for those in| 
pursuit of recreation. Daily stages ran from Newburgh toj^ 
Goshen, and from thence to the springs. The farmhouses in'-; 
the neighborhood blossomed out into boarding-houses for"^ 
the visitors. Jolly parties of the country belles and beaux, j 
"on pleasure bent," rode over to Cheechunk and danced and .] 
had a general good time. Lewis Denton, John J. Heard I 
and Calvin Gardner were at one time its managers. The [ 
waters were analyzed and pronounced by the experts of the ' 
day to be beneficial in many grievous ailments. The Chee- 
chunk House was a scene of life, light and gaiety for years. 
Instances were recorded of patients, in their zeal, almost kill- 
ing themselves by excessive use of the waters, and returning 
home to be cured by their own doctor of chronic gripes and 
other pestiferous torments, but these victims of excess in 
no way diminished the fashion and popularity of the Orange 
County medicinal waters. It may be mentioned, sub rosa, 
that a bar was kept, supplied with the very choicest wines 



THE BYGONE DOCTOR 125 

and other refreshments. A wedding" trip to Cheechunk was 
the acme of many a rural pair's ambition. How it came to 
fall into "innocuous desuetude" is unknown. Those ac- 
quainted with it ever recalled its charms with vivid delight, 
and children loved to listen to their elders' tales of Chee- 
chunk. 

The passing of the protuberant old iron dinner-pot was 
thought by some to be positively a detriment to health, as 
much food cooked in it was equal to a draught from a cha- 
lybeate spring, potatoes, especially, coming from its ample 
depths of a complexion dark and bilious, while beans, dried 
and green ; rice, etc., resembled rations of prepared poison. 
Nevertheless, the mothers clung to them, and when modern 
innovations were introduced, would have none of them, de- 
claring the food not so seasoned, so healthful or toothsome as 
when it came forth from that venerable heirloom, some as- 
serting that it was an antidote for all "tooth evils and 
humors." 

When a child was born lifeless, its body was laid in wood 
ashes, warm from the hearthstone, and the smoke of tobacco 
thrown into the intestines. This means of resuscitation w^as 
not only in vogue among the good w^omen who' ministered to 
each other, but was recommended by doctors. It was said 
to be used by the Indian squaws. 

In sunstroke the unfortunate was rubbed with the juice 
of the water-pepper, or smartweed, and sometimes the body 
was smartly struck with fine stinging whips, intermingled 
wdth nettles. A plaster of tar and rum w^as also placed upon 
the spinal column. 

Many native remedies were in vogue as styptics. Among 
these, the excrescence of the oak tree w^as a favorite, a 
species of fungus easily procured. It was gathered in au- 
tumn and the portion next the outside utilized. This was 
pounded until it became pliable and feltlike, and a slice of it 
laid on a bleeding part was said to compress the wound, 



126 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

draw the cut together and stop bleeding. It was declared 
to have the power of chnging to the hurt until its mission 
was accomplished. 

A lady used to relate a case of cure coming under her eye 
so decidedly unique that it is worthy of mention. A poor 
old slave, of but little more use in the family to which she 
belonged, was allowed to work about for the small pittance 
she could earn. While washing in a farmhouse in the sub- 
urbs, a dog belonging to the family severely bit her. The 
mistress of the house immediately declared that she had al- 
ways heard that "the hair of the same dog would cure the 
wound," and straightway fell upon Towser, and scissors in 
hand, proceeded to cut a goodly quantity of hair from his 
bushy caudal which she carefully placed on the mangled 
flesh and bound it up. All day the poor creature toiled in 
agony, the pricking, irritating hair working into the wound. 
On being discharged at night, lame, weak and suffering, she 
sought the ministrations of the lady who related the incident, 
and after washing, and a long time spent in extracting the 
hair from the sensitive and swollen hurt, and carefully dress- 
ing it with healing ointment, the poor deluded slave was 
made comfortable. 

A cure for the bite of a rattlesnake was to take hore- 
hound and plantain, the entire plant and root in quantity, 
bruise and extract the juice, and give a large spoonful; this 
to be followed by one more, if the patient were not relieved. 
The wound was immediately thoroughly washed with tur- 
pentine and water, and a poultice of tobacco placed upon it. 
This remedy was said, if applied in time, to seldom fail. 

For deafness our forefathers used the gall of an eel, 
dropped in sweet oil, and considered it an absolute specific 
for the affliction when not chronic. 

To cure toothache, the root of the yellow water lily was 
scraped and laid on and about the tooth. It was said to 



THE BYGONE DOCTOR 127 

give almost instant relief. It is poisonous, and must have 
been applied with caution. 

These are many of the healing remedies, dear to the 
hearts of our ancestors. Often far from a physician, they 
learned to cull from Nature's multifarious stores such sim- 
ples as they required, and their faith in them was boundless. 
Tradition asserts that many of their virtues were made 
known by the Indians. Want of understanding and super- 
stition mingled in their beliefs and manner of healing, but 
they managed to live to ripe old age quite universally. Ven- 
erable aunts and grandmothers skilled in the knowledge of 
herbs, from early spring to fall sought in field and wood the 
plants and roots of healing, carefully preserving them 
against the days when they would be needed. 

The country pastor of old times was frequently a half- 
fledged doctor, and pulled teeth, opened felons and extracted 
slivers, ministering to both body and soul. One, particular- 
ly, is recalled, a most capable, intelligent, and tender-hearted 
healer. 

Many terrible mistakes were made by persons ignorant of 
the powerful effects of the cullings from the vegetable king- 
dom. A poor woman died a death of agony from taking too 
strong an infusion of wild cherry bark and knowing no an- 
tidote for the powerful prussic acid poison. 

Of all the horrors of that day none so chill the blood as 
the methods of disposing of patients afflicted with hydropho- 
bia. They were sometimes laid between feather beds and 
actually smothered to death. An aged resident said he wit- 
nessed this done in his youth, the subject being a young girl 
of fourteen. When she became dangerously violent, and 
her agonies could not be assuaged, she was thrown between 
beds and held down by four strong men until dead. Some- 
times the afflicted were bound down and slowly bled to 
death. This was long the custom in ancient England. 

An amusing incident is related of early homeopathy in 



128 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

Warwick. A gentleman was ill and a homeopathic physi- 
cian was called. A paper containing a number of infinitesi- 
mal globules was left, with strict injunctions to put them 
carefully away, as they were very powerful and dangerous. 
They were hidden, with forethought and care, in the clock, 
and given at certain intervals as prescribed. After the first 
few doses, on going for the rest, all were missing, and the 
frightened housewife began to inquire among her brood. 
Her little daughter informed her that Betty, a small colored 
girl employed in the family, had climbed up to the clock, 
found the papers and "licked them all down," Betty was 
summoned, so was the M. D. in hot haste, who affirmed, 
consolingly, that they would not hurt a healthy young darky, 
and Betty went on her way rejoicing. The introduction of 
homeopathy was met with derision and incredulity. Wild 
and flying rumors prevailed concerning the disciples of 
Hahnemann. Of one of the physicans who took up the doc- 
trine the most astounding stories were circulated. It was said 
he used poisons so virulent that his patients were internally 
flayed, that the venom of the rattlesnake, arsenic and various 
other "pizens," the name of which was legion, were literally 
eating the "innards" out of the community gullible enough 
to make a trial of the new method of cure. In contradis- 
tinction to this, others affirmed that the little pellets were 
simply sugar, and that no medicines were administered what- 
soever, notwithstanding one respectable citizen was said to 
have expired with his stomach eaten out like a sieve; an- 
other with his brain in a state of spontaneous combustion, 
shrieking madly, "My head is on fire" ; and still a third, with 
a deep, bloody canal in the tongue, where the corrosive poi- 
sons had wended their way into his unsuspecting and credu- 
lous sesophagus. The parties of the second part were said 
to lie dying unmedicined like slaughtered lambs, with the 
meek and harmless saccharine globules slowly filtering away 
in their mouths, while the rapacious physician pocketed 



THE BYGONE DOCTOR 129 

"shekels" for "doing nothing at all." Meantime, the sub- 
ject of all this animadversion went on his way busily toiling 
among patients, who seemed to trust and cling to him in the 
face of all this, and actually won professional success, and 
mayhap laughed in his sleeve at the hydra-headed rumors 
following his busy path. And thus the new school of medi- 
cine won its way in the village, and microscopic globules 
and dilutions ad infinituui came to stay. 

Later on, a lank}-, solemn and mezzotoned biped came, 
with a small funereal casket in his possession, containing 
what he called "Metallic Tractors." They were said to 
make the blind to see, the deaf to hear, the lame to skip like 
roebucks. They were pressed or drawn lightly across 
troubled parts, and the vender vowed and avowed, and, like 
the worthy deacon, "swowed," that cures and healing mi- 
raculous followed in their train. A cancer was said to be 
stayed in its mad career ; a tiunor stood right where it was, 
and though refusing to go back on itself, enlarged no more 
under the mystical influence of the "Metallic Tractor." 
Toothache, that "bane to pleasure's fairy spell," fled under 
its galvanic influence, and pain was generally considered as 
banished from the community. A goodly sum was charged 
for them, the "Tractor" healer wended his way from house 
to house, ate the fat of the land, slept between lavendered 
linen, on the best feather beds, and his pocket bulged as the 
miniature ebon casket parted with the three-inch bits of 
metal. /\11 at once, however, ears failed to hear, teeth be- 
gan to jump and tear, rheumatic limbs to balk and refuse to 
travel worse than a roan mule, and the "Metallic Tractor" 
individual suddenly and unaccountably disappeared, in an 
excess of generosity giving away a few unsold "Tractors" 
to grateful recipients who were ignorant of their dismal 
failure. One worthy farmer, grievously beset with rheu- 
matic twinges, averred he wished to get well to follow on 
the track of the vanished vender and "kick him off a handy 



I30 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

jumping-O'ff place," and numerous and dire were the male- 
dictions breathed on his head. The bits of magical metal 
at last fell to such "base uses" that they were punched and 
ignobly hung upon a string for the amusement of successive 
babies, whose teeth came, probably, with greater ease and 
precision from the soothing current of the galvanic play- 
thing. 

In fevers and inflammatory ailments, it was quite custom- 
ary to split a black hen in two and bind the warm, palpitat- 
ing halves on the palms of the hands. An intelligent teacher 
told me of being taken, as a child, to the deathbed of an 
uncle, dying of fever. The patient was in a state of low- 
muttering delirium, and on his restless, waving hands a,n 
anxious neighbor had tied a black fowl in the accustomed 
manner. For long months after night was made hideous to 
the poor child by the memories of this ill-timed visit, and a 
black hen seemed the insignia of death. As if nothing were 
lacking to complete the horror of the scene, the warm blood 
frequently filtered from the bandaged hands over the pa- 
tient and bed-linen. 

In inflammation of the lungs and bowels, pleurisy, etc., a 
sheep was killed, the skin stripped ofT and wrapped, reeking, 
about the patient. Sometimes, in acute and stubborn cases, 
two, or even three sheep, were dispatched for one person. 
The flesh was never eaten by the family, but was given to 
the needy. 

The feathers of pigeons (very plentiful in their season in 
early days) were commonly cured and put in beds and pil- 
lows, and a superstition reigned that no poor soul could take 
easy flight from its lifelong house of clay if a single pigeon's 
feather were in the dying-bed. So, many a time and oft, the 
passing sufferer was lifted from bed to bed, and if the mor- 
tal throes continued hard and unrelenting in severing the 
"mystic union," after every bed had been tried and each one 
duly condemned as surely having a pigeon feather some- 



THE BYGONE DOCTOR 131 

where in it, the patient was laid on a pallet of straw to die, 
and after this was always considered easy. Surely it was a 
preferable couch. This was a common and widespread su- 
perstition. 

Grievous and unbearable our forefathers considered their 
lives when it fell out no son was born or lived to inherit the 
family name and estate. Especially in settlements where 
agriculture was the prominent occupation was this notice- 
able, and when the father's steps began to falter, and his 
once sturdy arms to fail, it was a sorrowful house which had 
no son to manage the homestead acres and hand down the 
name. Sometimes — 

The bn.by boy whose young strong arm 
They hoped would till the dear old farm 

died ; again he never came, and so, just as this storv^ has crept 
into the most noble houses of Europe and insinuated itself 
' amid the folds of the purple, in the secluded township it was 
once whispered that a soft-hearted physician took part in 
providing an heir for a childless home. Whether true or 
false the story lived ; so did the boy, and held name and lands 
fast and fair. 

The doctor of whom this legend is told deserves more 
than a passing word. He was prominent among worthy 
leeches who ministered to the fathers those remedies amaz- 
ing now to read of (what must they have been to swallow?) 
and was a cautious and popular practitioner. It cannot be 
learned that "specialties" were much known to early rural 
times, although this kind old leech had one, in fact, two. 
He was the most astute and successful physician in falling 
upon and routing that fell enemy to the peace and comfort 
of our sires, "bilious bile" — so called — ever known. With 
deep research and masterful skill our doctor had succeeded 
in compounding a draught called "i)ikery purge," of a po- 
tency so profound and penetrating that its fame went from 



132 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

the depths of the vale even unto the feet of the sentinel pines 
fringing the mountain's side. When the old-time stomach 
— with that intelligence of its own which it has transmitted 
to all its line — ^became aware of the intruder, it found in the 
"pikery purge" of the genial doctor an unfailing remedy. 
Armed cap-a-pie and entering the gates of the mouth with 
qualms and unutterable contortions of countenance heralding 
its approach, on reaching its destination it attacked that 
demon with the yellowish green complexion and sent him 
after a siege, short but fierce, growling and grumbling from 
the citadel, vanquishing him so effectually that he lay low 
for many a day. Tradition does not record that the "pikery 
purge" ever succeeded in slaughtering this foul fiend out- 
right, but certain it is one or two doses would end his diab- 
olism effectually for the time being. To be sure, the ex- 
cellent healer's draught sometimes barely missed sending 
his patient on a far journey from which history, both sacred 
and profane, gives but few instances of home-coming, but 
this in no wise detracted from its popularity. It is believed 
all did return eventually, though frequently in a state so 
limp and disheartened that their best friends averred they 
should scarcely have known them. But what stronghold 
would not quake v/hen knights and dragons closed in deadly 
combat ? 

Our doctor's second specialty was introducing buds into 
society, and our own dear grandmother was one of those 
whom he "brought out." Now they were always genuine 
buds, and though in these latter days it is currently whis- 
pered they are occasionally held back until half blown by 
lovely mammas in terror of that odious exclamation, "Is it 
possible she has a daughter as old as that?" (with irritat- 
ing emphasis on the "that"), no such legend comes down 
through the vista of the years of our doctor's buds. Some- 
times there was a "tea," and though "pink teas" were un- 
known, the bud was invariably so, and whether son or 



THE BYGONE DOCTOR 133 

daughter the ceremonies were the same. Our doctor was 
considered lucky, and haven't we all heard that, "It is just as 
fortunate to be born lucky as rich." Aye! a thousand times 
more so, for "riches take to themselves wings and fly away," 
but born luck, never! He had some ways distinctly his own, 
and clung to them with pertinacity. He always insisted on 
dressing the "bud/' for "luck," said our doctor. If it were 
a boy, he drew every article of its wardrobe on over its feet. 
If a 'girl, all was put on carefully over the head, and he 
averred this brought luck unlimited and past finding out to 
the debutante. Local history solemnly asserted that every 
bud so arrayed did live, thrive and have its being, and met 
teething, whoopingcough, measles and all pestilent ills of 
childhood a conqueror. It also declared that in the few 
instances recorded of interference by grandmammas, aunts 
and officious neighbors, who prevented the doctor from ex- 
ercising his prerogative, no luck at all followed its mortal 
career, and it became the very football of calamity. Indeed, 
one, whom a "sot" and resolute great aunt fairly tore from 
the excellent leech's luck-encircling arms and proceeded to 
robe all unmindful of ups and downs, is reported to have 
been stolen by Indians and never found. Shield pins, those 
conducers to the peace and easement of modern babyhood, 
were unknown in those primitive days. To the ancient im- 
plement of torture with its splintered head of w^ound brass 
wire, our whimsical old leech had an insistent aversion, so 
he always called for a needle and thread, sighted the eye 
with one of his own tightly closed, and the other screwed 
nearly to the top of his head, inserted the thread, doubled it, 
and secured it with a protuberant knot; then, putting the 
thimble carefully on his thumb, he proceeded to sew every 
article on the baby's blessed back. "No pins in their pelts 
while I'm around," he would declare, emphatically. 

Another instance of his wisdom comes down through the 
ages. A patient lying very ill and subject to prostrating 



134 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

"sweats" was besought by the doctor to have a cool, whole- 
some bed of oaten straw to lie upon, mattresses being un- 
known. It was fall, the straw sweet, golden, and making a 
delicious couch, but in vain did the doctor beseech her to give 
up the feathery abyss where she lay in perspiring weakness. 
She was evidently "a woman of will," a class tlie stoutest 
heart may well shiver at encountering, for her family, sec- 
onding the doctor's orders, were powerless to enforce them. 
So it befell that one afternoon, after his usual visit, the pa- 
tient fell into a sleep profound cind lasti/ig, and when she 
awoke found herself on a restful bed of newly threshed 
straw. Protest was in vain. She had but one feather bed ; 
that the doctor had carried off, and it was snugly ensconced 
in his garret. Thereafter she recovered, and the feathers 
got a thoroughly prolonged airing. 

Our doctor had a wife, a thrifty, notable housekeeper, very 
loquacious and known in the vernacular of the day as a 
"goer." And why not, pray? She had no family of her 
own, and when all was spick and span in the low-roomed, 
broad old house, why shouldn't she put on her sunbonnet, 
slip the doctor's blue yarn stocking into her capacious pocket 
and chat and knit a while with a friendly neighbor? She 
was a good wife, kept his shoe-buckles bright as the tea- 
spoons, his clothes brushed and pressed from the suspicion 
of a crease, his saddle-bags oiled and polished, and allowed 
him to ride her own good steed when his Rosinante was 
weary and footsore. Also did she, as became a doctor's 
helpmeet, see with vigilant eyes that his lancet was in its 
case and the bottle of "pikery purge" full and well corked. 
Indeed, the good healer was a lucky man, and no wonder 
luck, as it were, dripped from the tips of his plump and rosy 
fingers. But two earthly gifts desirable were denied him. 
He had no heir, and he had no hair. He was utterly, hope- 
lessly bald ; his fine, well-shaped head, rubicund and shining. 
But he took these haps with the philosophy and urbanity 



THE BYGONE DOCTOR 135 

characteristic of him, and used to remark, "Matilda can't 
say I have a single jealous hair in my head." This peculi- 
arity gave hmi a gentle, almost infantile appearance, and 
when a little harassed by unforeseen complications arising 
from conflicts of unlooked-for fierceness between the "bil- 
ious bile" and the "pikery purge," he would rub his small 
fat hand over his perplexed brow in the most quizzically 
perturbed manner, and ejaculate, "Drat it all, I say!" 

And now, surely our physician has had more than the 
passing notice he was declared entitled to, and no apology 
is deemed necessary in giving to the small world where he 
once lived and flourished the following story. For the 
legend runneth that in the town dwelt a pair with generous 
fortune and many goodly fields, and graves in the ancient 
God's Acre holding all those they had fondly hoped would 
inherit them, and like those of old, they grieved greatly over 
it, and lamented their desolate home. In this strait they 
appealed to the kindly little doctor. No doubt he rubbed 
his shining pate, and puckered his rosy fat forehead, but in 
due time, it is asserted, he did find and convey to that home- 
stead a hapless waif, born with no "gold spoon in its mouth," 
who was received with joy unspeakable, became "a well- 
spring of pleasure," and was duly accredited as their own. 
And "nobody knew whether it was, and nobody knew wheth- 
er it wasn't," echoed puzzled Rumor. "Ten years since little 
Nathan died," said the gossips. "And it's very strange," 
and "Who'd 't thought it ?" went round and about the coun- 
tryside. And the story came to the ears of our doctor's 
thrifty and bustling spouse, and they fairly tingled with 
curiosity under her immaculate sunbonnet. One night, 
seated beside the blazing hearth, she plucked up courage and 
asked him, plimip and plain, whether it were true or not. 
Now our doctor snuffed, and the fragrant maccaboy was 
grateful to his nostrils, and, furthermore, he owned a most 



136 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

beautiful snuffbox, with a history, it was said, but no one 
ever heard what the history was, for the doctor never told 
it, and that added intensely to its interest. On its polished 
cover was a picture of a famous English beauty, in a sweep- 
ing riding habit of forest green, a stunning cap of scarlet 
velvet on her prideful head, and hands more beautiful than 
sculpture tilting shrouding skirt from dainty feet. Our 
doctor's good dame was far from beautiful, but capable she 
was, and had comfortable possessions. Many a time and 
oft, the labors and cares of the day past, demands on the 
"pikery purge" in abeyance, and no buds ready to introduce, 
our doctor would stretch himself luxuriously on the se'ttle, 
pull out the box, tap it gently, take a pinch, and then look 
long at that lovely aristocratic face. He was thus engaged 
the very night his Matilda asked him concerning the rumor, 
and worthy soul ! it is not believed she ever once had a 
suspicion that her liege lord in this surreptitious manner 
was indulging a beauty-loving nature, and seeking in the 
fair face on his snuffbox what he did not find in that home- 
spun countenance presiding over his hearth. And this is 
what she told my own great-grandmother, her nearest and 
dearest friend, of the aiuazing and unheard-of conduct of the 
doctor in answer to her legitimate wifely question. First 
he made his eyes very round and faraway, a trick it is 
thought he probably contracted in repelling too persistent 
questioning in regard to unaccountable antics of the "pikery 
purge." Then he rapped his snuffbox, lifted the lid, took a 
generous pinch, and slowly inhaling the last dust, leaned 
back in the capacious depths of the settle, and sneezed and 
sneezed and sneezed, and sneezed and sneezed and sneezed. 
Taking out his red silk handkerchief, he wiped his nose 
dubiously, closed the box, shut his eyes, went to sleep, and 
snored and snored and snored, not aggressively, nor rum- 
blingly, but as gently and peacefully as if a question mo- 



THE BYGONE DOCTOR 137 

mentous and stirring all womankind round and about had 
not just entered his ears. Like a discreet mate as she was, 
his spouse let him snore undisturbed until ten o'clock, when 
she awoke him and saw that he was safely bestowed in bed ; 
and nevermore did this ensample of a woman broach that 
question again. May all wifehood copy her, and nagged 
husbands reverence her memory. And whether there was 
an adopted heir to this estate in the secluded township there 
has never existed the necessity of another. If the tale be 
true, one old doctor helped to graft goodly stock on a failing 
ancestral tree, and buried the secret in his snufifbox forever. 
So with this bit of local tradition let the curtain fall gently 
on the little doctor, a few more of whose whimsicalities are 
left on record. He was wont to declare that "Matilda never 
could say that he found any fault with her management of 
their children," and that "nobody could feel hurt at not get- 
ting a lock of his hair after lie was gone" ; also did he leave 
in his will directions explicit for the compounding and ad- 
ministering of the "pikery purge," asserting that after years 
of practice he had found it the one unfailing antidote for that 
foe to humanity, "bilious bile," for whose onslaughts he con- 
sidered it "beyond the beyondest." 

As has been mentioned, especially in agricultural districts 
of our new world, was this fervent wish of the hearts of 
our forefathers for sons evinced. "In a. son," says an old 
writer, "seemed the one desire of the heart. Sons are cedars 
of Lebanon, daughters are roses of Sharon." They continued 
undeterred in this longing, though they saw many a time 
and oft that the fibre of this yearned for cedar was of poor 
quality. "A son renews the links with life," said another 
ancient. Even our immortal first chieftain, whom "Nature 
left childless that his people might call him Father/' fre- 
quently ex])resses in his well-kept diary and in letters to 
friends the insistent wish for children of his own. That he 



138 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

was a most affectionate and devoted stepfather to his wife's 
children is well known, and if all accounts of Lady Martha's 
spirit, loyal love and devotion are correct, it is not to be be- 
lieved that he would have had easy quarters of hours had he 
not been, Chief Magistrate of a nation though he was. 

As I have pulled the bobbins to loose the latches of these 
old-time homes, I have culled from the few papers and maga- 
zines that came in those early days to cheer their hearths 
numerous bits of verse bearing on this soft spot in our grand 
sires' hearts. Out of the many gathered this seems most 
sweet and sensible: 

KEEPING THE FARM. 

They sat on the grassy terrace 

That sloped to the setting sun, 
The farmer gray and his kind old wife, 

When the golden day was done ; 
And like a picture at their feet. 
Stretched the homestead farm in the summer sweet. 

Bronzed was the wheat for the sickle 

On the upland to the east; 
The meadows low, too wet to mow, 

Should be dry in a week at least, 
But the old man's arm would never again 
Guide the harvest home in the loaded wain. 

The buckwheat ground was awaiting 

The path of the furrowing plow ; 
Oh ! once how his hand could hold it. 

In the time long gone b}' now. 
With a sigh he looked in his wife's mild face 
And said, "I think we must sell the place, 

"For we are too old to work it. 

And labor is scarce and high, 
With all I can do things go to rack," 

And he breathed a heavy sigh 
As he raised his eyes to the old elm low 
That mingled its green with his locks of snow. 

Then the good wife looked up fondly 

To the dimming eyes at her side, 
And a quiver stirred her patient mouth 

As she thought of the babe who died — 
The longed-for boy who when they were old 

Would have taken the farm to have and to hold. 



THE BYGONE DOCTOR 139 

e's 

a's They were busy with thoughts of the future, 

They were groping in the past ; 
The sad old pair — so they failed to see 

Two forms that lengthening cast 
Their blended shades on the terrace green, 
As slowly they came upon the scene. 

Two aged brows lifted in greeting 
i^' ' Blushes hidden on mother's breast, 

A faltering boon at the father's knee, 

And then we can guess the rest ; 
As the loving mother, smiling through tears, 
Sobs, "God has been better than nil our fears. 

"He hath not taken our daughter 

But given us back a son ; 
Yes, now the old farm shall look up, John, 

And the work in season be done ; 
For our girl has whispered in my ear 
That Reuben will stay and help us here. 

"We had thought and talked it over. 
And worried and grieved to our harm ; 

And still could see no good plan, John, 
By which we could keep the farm ; 

But with God's good help our girl to-day 

Has shown us the best and easiest way.'' 



} 



VI 

A Sister and a Brother 




jjonal 
it from 



VI 



A Sister and a Brother 

F ALL the old-time residents of Warwick 
none seem to have had a more interesting and 
romantic Hfe story than Hannah Bennett and 
her brother Jonah. She was born in Fair- 
field County, Conn., in 1759. Her father, 
Bennett, purchased a tract of hmd there, cleared 
the " forest primeval," and, building thereon 



a log cabin, roomy and comfortable, married and settled 
down. It was a happy spot, this lowly home in the wild- 
wood, for love and peace (so often strangers to palace halls) 
dwelt therein. When Hannah was twelve years of age a 
son was born wlio was named Jonah for his father, as was 
old-time custom almost universally. Great was the joy 
and pride in the home at this event. He was a handsome 
child, with large, black eyes, very dark hair^ tall, straight, 
and so bright and winsome he won all hearts, and from 
his birth was the family idol. When he was two years of 
lage the loved wife and mother suddenly died, leaving a 
lonely home and stricken hearts indeed. Hannah was just 
fourteen, and hushing her grief, she sprang earnestly to the 
call of duty with the strong afifection and devotion of her 
nature, and exerted every energy to care for the household. 
There was not nmch of adornment within that home. The 
floors were bare save for the bark mats, a little clock with 
a red rooster on it stood on the shelf ; no picture brightened 



144 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

its rough walls. That "book of books" of which a long- 
gone writer said : 

This little book I'd rather own 

Than all t!he gold and gems 
That e'er in monarch's coffers shone — 

Their royal diadems. ', 

Nay, were the seas one chrysolite, 

The earth a golden ball, 
And diamonds all the stars of night, 

This book were worth them all, 

was the only literature the home knew. 

This home spot was full of beauty to the imaginative 
girl, a true poet, though she never wrote a line. Its staunch 
logs, wrested from the forest fastnesses, were toned down 
to a soft, dark gray by sun and snows and beating storms ; 
the woods were fragrant with the beautiful flowers of early 
times, and as she wandered there with the baby brother in 
her arms, sunlight and (shadow trembled and quivered 
through the interlacing boughs upon her young head. To 
this lowly birthplace, so soon to be rudely severed from her 
life, her thoughts ever turned with fondest affection. She 
used to tell her children of the wonderful flower-shaped 
forms the snow drifted in the chinks of the logs around her 
window and the delicate windrows blown against the huge 
foundation oaks, to crystallize there, for where art is not 
nature reigns supreme in attraction. In a year and a half 
her father informed her that he was to be married again, 
and in a short time a young stepmother was brought to fill 
the sad vacancy made by the mother's death. Long, long 
ago a father on the eve of taking a young new wife found 
pinned to the mother's portrait in his room these lines from 
a daughter's hand, aye ! and from her heart, too, I am sure : 

Father, thou hast not the tale denied ; 

And they say that ere noon to-morrow, 
Thou'lt bring back a radiant and smiling bride. 

To our lonely house of sorrow. 



A SISTER AND A BROTHER 145 

I would wish thee joy of thy coming bliss. 

But tears are my words suppressing; 
I think on my mother's dying kiss, 

On my mother's dying blessing. 

To-morrow when all is festal guise. 

And guests our rooms are filling, 
The calm, meek gaze of these gentle eyes 

Might thy soul with grief be thrilling. 

Then father, dear father, oh, grant to-night, 

Ere the bridal crowd's intrusion, 
I remove this picture from thy sight 

To my chamber's still seclusion. 

She will heed me not in the joyous pride 

Of her pomp and friends and beauty. 
For little need hath a new-made bride 

Of a daughter's quiet duty. 

Poor Hannah made no appeal in the humble home to her 
father, and the young wife's feet crossed the threshold not 
to bring comfort and healing to the smitten household, but 
sorrow and discord perverting her mission and making her 
new name a misnomer as far as the orphan babe was con- 
cerned. From the first she evinced a marked dislike for the 
boy, and readily found occasion to display her jealousy and 
ill-feeling, nor had this new mother any need "of a daugh- 
ter's quiet duty." 

When the prospect of a child of her own became apparent, 
her animosity increased and took the fonn of active un- 
kindness This was noted with pain by the indulgent father. 
He tried to reason away her dislike, but the heart that should 
of all hearts been tender, was cold and obdurate, and no 
expostulation could change her attitude. The loving and 
spirited Hannah saw all this with anguish. She felt her 
dear father's domestic peace was destroyed, beheld her 
mother's idolized babe the target for unreasoning hate and 
ill-treatment, and the situation became unbearable. There 
was no more joy in that pleasant cabin home, with its red 
cherry trees bending above the roof; no more merry play at 
"Puss in (he Corner" evenings with little Jonah before the 



146 UNDER OLD ROOETREES 

great fireplace sending the glow of its logs through the 
room. A constrained quiet was over all ; the homely nest 
of sweet domestic comfort and content was gone for her 
fprever. Hannah Bennett was not of that mould, spiritless, 
inert, that can behold an existing wrong and seek to devise 
no remedy. Day and night she pondered on some course 
of action. A short time before the death of her mother 
friends had removed from Connecticut to Warwick. Some 
members of a family returning on a visit had brought the 
news that it was a beautiful, goodly land and of their de- 
light in it. As she ceaselessly turned over in her mind a 
thousand plans for relief, the thought of Warwick came to 
her. The young wife had for several weeks displayed un- 
usual irritation, and the distracted father had .finally decided 
to take her on a visit of a week to her parents, a journey of 
about ten miles. Hannah assisted industriously to make 
them ready and saddling their horses they started. His 
children kissed him a fond good-by (alas, how little he 
knew !") , and. with sorrow tugging at her young heart, the 
girl went into the house to carry out her resolve. Her op- 
portunity dawned, and she seized it. 

For two davs and nights Hannah worked diligently mak- 
ing Jonah a cloth cap, with broad ear-laps, from a remnant 
of her father's new suit, and a Ions-, warmly lined pair of 
trousers of the same, for it was chill, early spring. She 
then put such needful articles as would not impede her jour- 
nev in a long linen pillow slip Cher onlv suit-case), securely 
hid the little sum of monev she possessed in Jonah's cap, 
and made ready to start. Old memories came thick and 
fast upon her mind while preparing to start, and chief 
among them crowded thoughts of that dear lost mother 
whose cherished babe she was endeavoring to rescue from 
oppression, and her tears fell freelv as she took a last look 
around the once glad spot. Rut a short time before her 
mother's death she had asked her to make some "jumbles," 



A SISTER AND A BROTHER 147 

a hard, sweet cake in which Httle Jonah was very fond of 
putting his white teeth, and had heard her express a wish 
for a new roIHng pin to press them out. Ever ready with 
her hands, Hannah set to work, and from a Hmb of red 
cherry fashioned one and presented it to the pleased mother. 
As she was leaving, her eyes fell upon this homely domestic 
implement as it lay upon the dresser. Like a flash came 
back the pleasant scene of their old-time happiness ; the 
kind mother as she stood in the glow of the firelight prepar- 
ing some good thing in the shape of dainties for them, while 
she sat by her side with the loved boy on her lap. Often 
she would print a border on the cakes and pies with the 
dried capsules of her poppies, while little Jonah's pleased, 
bright eyes looked wonderingl|y on. She had donned for 
her journey a warm flannel dress in which she had made a 
pocket deep and wide, in anticipation of her flight. 

"Stepmother shall never have the rolling pin I made for 
mother," she said, impulsively, and, seizing it, dropped it in 
her pocket. Then, hurrying out, she saddled her strong, 
gentle horse, set little Jonah in the saddle, fastened the 
pillow-case containing all their earthly possessions securely 
across his back, locked the door, and, placing the key under 
the rough bark mat, turned her horse's head for Warwick 
town and the friends there. As she mounted her horse 
Jonah, perched there in his long trousers and overshadowing 
- ear-laps, whispered in a voice awed by this uncanny flight 
in the early dark, "Hanny, can't I take the little clock with 
the red rooster, 'cause youse got the rolHn' pin ?" Poor 
child ! it was perhaps his only semblance of a real toy and 
had been the object to which his first baby glances had 
been directed. Knowing Hannah as well as we do, we al- 
most wonder she didn't attempt to accomplish it at the plead- 
ing of that loved voice. 

It was not daylight when Hannah set forth, for she 
wished to avoid the eyes of the scattered neighbors near. 
She had never been twenty miles from home in her life ; 



148 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

the way after a short time was entirely unknown to her, 
much of it lying through long stretches of wood, and she 
had constantly to inquire and study her route with patience 
and care. But the pure, loyal love of a true woman's heart 
is ever a safe compass. She fed herself, the child and horse 
at farm homes on the way, and rested therein at night, pay- 
ing for it out of her slender store. Numerous adventures 
befell her which would have appalled a more timorous nat- 
ure. Once, riding through a heavily wooded stretch, her 
trusty horse shied violently, and, reining him in, she saw a 
wildcat in the trees above her head looking down upon her 
with greedy eyes. Other skulking animals frequently fled 
her path. Of Indians she always declared she felt fear. 
Once she was refused shelter at nightfall, at the only house 
she came upon for many miles, by a straight-laced Puritan 
matron who distrusted her simple story and thought all was 
not right with a girl riding alone through the country with 
a child in her arms. Poor, narrow purist! As if such a 
girl more than any other should not have appealed to her 
woman's nature. Her husband, all honor to his good, 
Christian heart, looked on the desolate girl with pitying 
eyes, assuring his wife she was too young to possibly be 
the mother of a boy as large as Jonah. She was reluctantly 
allowed to remain and rest the night, though the forbidding 
looks and scant courtesy of the wife caused her the chilled 
comfort of the unwelcome guest. Frequently she rode in 
heavy rains; often saw the day fast waning and no shelter 
near. Sometimes she became so sleepy with the strain of 
holding the child (who often slept during the journey, a 
dead weight on her arm) that she was in danger of falling 
ofif and breaking her adventurous young neck. But "love 
is strong as death"; she did not allow her black eyes to 
close, but held on her way — ^her pole star Warwick. 

Her horse was a young one, very gentle and well broken 
by her father for her own use, but many wildwood sights, 
sounds and odors caused him to require her firm hand and 



A SISTER AND A BROTHER i49 

vigilant eye constantly. Once a thorn pierced his foot, and 
she was detained for a time by its removal and the healing 
of the hurt. 

On arriving at her destination Hannah was received with 
amazement by her friends. Scarcely were their senses able 
to credit her act, but their kindness and cordiality were 
boundless. She obtained a home in the family of a Mr. 
Minthorn, near Warwick. He bought her horse, paying 
her one hundred dollars for it, which gave her money for 
present need, and, being very skilful with the needle in sew- 
ing and embroidering on linen, she readily found employ- 
ment. The daring venture of the intrepid girl of but six- 
teen years caused widespread astonishment. Little Jonah, 
the innocent object of her flight, came in for his share of 
notice and interest The secluded hamlet boasted a small 
hero and a handsome young heroine. 

One day, sitting at the window of the Minthorn home fin- 
ishing a vest for the owner, Hannah saw two riders rein up 
at the gate. They were men of goodly presence, in riding 
suits, cloaked and spurred, mounted on the handsomest 
horses she had ever seen. They asked for a drink of water, 
and Hannah, laying down her work, rose, went out to the 
well, drew down the tall sweep, and, filling the great gourd 
dipper, carried it to th'em. They drank freely, handed 
back the gourd, and, thanking her politely, proceeded on 
their way. No doubt her dark eyes followed these unusual- 
appearing strangers with interest as they rode on. 

One of the riders was William Wood. He and a friend 
had ridden from the western part of New York State for the 
purpose of introducing a fine breed of horses in Orange 
County. The next spring a tournament was held in War- 
wick, in which the young men of the neighborhood and ad- 
jacent towns competed in various athletic games. A strmg 
of beautiful amber beads was ofifered as a reward to the 
champion in horsemanship. William Wood had returned 
to the village, and, entering the lists, won the trophy, Tak- 



:t5o UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

ing it on die point of his sword from the post on which it 
hung, he wheeled his horse to the grand stand, where Han- 
nah Bennett sat amid the spectators, and threw it about her 
slender neck. The astonished girl sat spellbound as the 
crowd cheered. It is well known that the fossil resin 
of which the beads is composed, and which is tinted like the 
evening sky, has the power to become electric, and some 
way, as it rested on her bosom, it sent the electric spark of 
love there. In a very short time her marriage to the gal- 
lant champion occurred at the Minthorn home. On a spot 
of land between Bellvale and Warwick they bought a farm, 
built a house and settled. Her love for her handsome young 
husband partook of the innate devotion of her nature. From 
the hour of her bridal, he was her pride and happiness. 

Let us not all this time forget Jonah, who was steadily 
attending school and growing into a fine, sturdy boy. His 
sister's love for him never flagged. His brother-in-law 
owning some of the finest horses ever known in Warwick, 
he was taught to ride fearlessly; a fine shot, he trained him 
to become an expert marksman and an adept in all athletic 
sports. When he grew to young manhood, a gentleman 
came up from New York City to purchase horses of his 
brother, bringing the thrilling news that there was a deter- 
mined uprising of the Pottawattamies and Wyandottes in 
the West, headed by the wily Blue Jacket, active chief in 
command. From the first Jonah's resentment burned fierce- 
ly against the cruel slayers of his countr^vmen. Anon the 
fighting spirit rose in him, and he communicated to the 
family his determination to start and assist in wiping out 
the redskins. His resolve was fixed. There was no pro- 
test from the sister, whose whole life had been a sacrifice to 
duty. As she had fitted him out for his baby flitting, again, 
with sorrow wringing her heart-strings, but no word on her 
lips breathed to dissuade him from what she felt to be his 
loyal duty, she prepared him for his journey. She carded 
the wool, spun the yarn and wove the cloth heavy and strong 



A SISTER AND A BROTHER' 151 

for a lull suit; dyed it blue, cut, titted and made every stitch 
of it with her own hands. At length all was ready; his 
bundle packed with everything she could devise for his com- 
fort ; there v^as a little gathering of friends to bid him good- 
by; her husband drove him to Newburgh, and from there 
Jonah started West. By boat, on foot, by wagon train, he 
at icngih reached the scene of hostilities at what is now 
Maumee City. 

On tiie 20th day of August, 1794, on the Maumee oc- 
curred the battle of Fallen Timbers. In it Jonah was terri- 
bly wounded by a bullet and left for dead on the battlefield. 
The ground was strewed with dead braves. In the night 
an Indian girl stole to the place to seek the ibody of her 
lover. She discovered him among the slain and wept. Her 
sobs roused Jonah. He raised his head ; she saw him and 
fled to the tents and told her people. Ere morning dawned 
they sought the spot and bore him away a captive. Wayne 
proceeded to la|y waste all the adjacent country, and the 
tribes fled across the Canada border, bearing Jonah with 
them. Pottawattamie was a savage antagonist in warfare. 
Wayne called him "The Wind," so relentless were his on- 
slaughts ; but in his custody Jonah Bennett was a kindly 
treated prisoner. They nursed him carefully, his wound 
healed, and, dressing him in their own clothing, they signi- 
fied their desire to adopt him into their tribe. His piercing 
black eyes, dark hair and fine, erect form no doubt attracted 
his savage captors and made a favorable impression. To 
their proposal, Jonah, to lull suspicion, signified his willing- 
ness to agree, but notwithstanding, felt himself never free 
from espionage. It was an Indian Vv'ho said "White man 
very onsartin." They did not trust Jonah. At length he 
almost felt hope die within him, and decided he would never 
again see old Warwick's green, secluded valley and the dear 
friends there. 

Time wore on, and one July night there arose a tempest 
of fearful power. Its fury fell on the Indian settlement, 



152 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

scattering destruction. Tlie blinding flashes of lightning 
were appalling. The savages thought the Great Spirit was 
angered with them and were panic-stricken. In the tumult 
Jonah's tent went over, a great tree near biy was riven with 
lightning, his watchers fled. He looked wildly about him, 
discovered he was free, and plunged forth into the drenched 
and storm-tossed woods. The tempest contmued for an 
hour, and under its cover he rushed on. Rain-soaked, beat- 
en by whipping branches, torn by briars, he flew until day- 
light. He was agile and fleet of foot, and as the sun rose 
found himself miles away from his Indian captors, in the 
heart of the dense forest, without arms or equipments of any 
kind. Wet, weary with the tumult of emotion that pos- 
sessed him, he lay down and slept some hours, and awoke 
to find himself very hungry. He had been an adept in set- 
ting snares in old Bellvale mountain in his boyhood, be- 
came more skilful while with the Indians, and now, with 
but his dextrous fingers, wove some, and lay down and 
awoke to find with joy they had not been set in vain. He 
had trapped a small creature, which he dispatched and ate 
and then proceeded on his way. He studied the sun as well 
as he was able, and struck for New York State, but felt each 
step, he was lost indeed; totally unarmed, he subsisted in 
the pathless forest on berries, roots, and with what he could 
slay with sticks and stones and capture with snares while 
he slept. He felt the need of salt greatly in his raw food 
diet. Well for this young David that he could throw a 
stone so unerringly. Not least among his troubles was the 
fear of skulking savages. Of these he was ever in terror. 
The crackling of a dry twig, the flutter of a leaf, thrilled 
his heart, for he knew to fall in their hands again meant 
captivity or a cruel end. He had known two years as a 
prisoner; his was a brave, free spirit, and he ever declared 
capture seemed to him worse than death. 

But now a new danger menaced him. With wandering, 
exposure and insufficient diet, his old wound began to 



A SISTER AND A BROTHER 153 

trouble hiin, and at length he became feeble and verl)' ill. 
Oh, we, surrounded by every comfort and blessing in hours 
of pain and illness, with the tender ministrations of the 
skilled trained nurse ever at command, let us think of this 
poor young volunteer lost in the solitude of wild, dense 
woods, alone, too worn to take another step, as one night he 
crawled under the shadow of a rock in this weary land, and 
laid his body, racked with pain, down on the wind-gathered 
leaves, never expecting to rise again! What thoughts of 
home, of his loving sister, of friends, of dear old Warwick 
must have crowded on his mind. He lay that night and 
all the next day too weak to rise, without food or a drop of 
water to his lips. As the shadows of the late afternoon 
crept around him, a rustling in the leaves near startled him ; 
the dread of a moccasined foot electrified him. He raised 
his head and saw an immense rattlesnake gliding along. A 
sudden thought seized him — here was food ! He caught up 
a fragment of rock and dashed it with all his newly roused 
force on the sinuous reptile. He struck the head squarely 
and crushed it, for Jonah always struck square. Grinding 
it ofif on the rock he put the warm, palpitating flesh to his 
lips and drank of the blood, stripped down the skin and ate 
greedily, lajv back and rested, then arose and dragged him- 
self from the dangerous proximity of a possible mate. Night 
drew on and he fell asleep and slept until morning; awoke 
refreshed, and the courage to live again filled his brave 
young heart. 

Fresh strength, new life and desire to rise and take up 
his struggle w^ent right through him. It must have given 
him a wondrous reviving, for that morning he marched on 
; and, inexpressible joy! came upon a fort with the glorious 
stars and stripes floating over it. Here the dauntless young 
recruit was received with hearty welcome ; a young physi- 
cian at the fort bestowed upon him every care and attention ; 
he was given a new suit of clothes, and after two months 
proceeded on his way. One evening William Wood, his 



154 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

wife and children sat around the fire. The door opened, an 
Indian in full dress entered. The little girls ran to hide 
behind their father, but his sister knew him instantl\\\ Her 
arms were around him, her warm, true kisses on his cheek. 

Wild was the excitement in the valley, for Jonah had 
been mourned as dead. Even his sister had almost yielded 
up hope. From the hour of his home-coming he was the 
centre of an admiring group wherever he might be. His 
Indian costume, which he carried home with him, was kept 
for years in the family. This suit, so elaborately embroid- 
ered with beads by the deft fingers of the squaws while he 
was in captivity, was hung' on a peg in the roomy garret of 
his sister's home after being duly admired. Many a night, 
after all the house was still, the three little nieces stole 
noiselessly as mice from their beds, mounted the ladder to 
the garret, and carefully snipped here and there a bead from 
the compact symbols and figures. These they strung on 
strong linen thread until Sally had a double row of blue, 
Mattie of pink and tiny Polly a gay necklace of rainbow 
dyes. They were only worn secretly at play and vigilantly 
guarded from the eyes of their parents. 

All loved to gather around the hospitable hearth and listen 
to Jonah's stories of the warfare ; Wayne, whom he almost 
idolized; of the sagacious Little Turtle, and Turkey Foot, 
who called Wayne "The man who never sleeps." Well was 
it to keep open eyes with such a foe. His struggles, trials, 
adventures from babyhood would fill a volume. His life 
was a romance that put fiction aside. He declared that the 
Indians treated him with uniform kindness, but were most 
vigilant in guarding against his escape, and never allowed 
him arms. He learned to speak their language, and became 
familiar with their customs. His home-coming was sad- 
dened by news of the death of his brave commander, and 
he mourned him as long as life lasted. Sad to relate, it was 
not a long one. The old, terrible w^ound through the thigh 
troubled him. His splendid constitution was greatly im- 



A SISTER AND A BROTHER 155 

paired by wanderings in the wild, pathless woods and 
through privations and exposure, and he passed away after 
a heroic struggle to get well, iiis ashes he in the First 
Baptist yard at Warwick. A great concourse for those 
early times followed him to the tomb. The red stone mark- 
ing his resting place, erected by Hannah, is gone. 

This little sketch alone rescues his memory from oblivion. 
Why this early "God's Acre" containing the precious dust 
of so many of Warwick's pioneers was once allowed to 
bet.ome a common, its graves obliterated, the stones over- 
thrown and lost beneath the clods, is amazmg. Honored 
dead lie there, now indeed "dust to dust" — Elder James 
Benedict, Daniel Burt, the Sayers — so many, many of the 
grand pioneers who settled our native home. As for years 
I have sought every item I could collect concerning them, 
I have ever marked the "culture and observance" of these 
rugged settlers. How grand they were ! Why did their 
children not observe the care of their hallowed graves? 
With the removal of the church seemed to die out interest 
in the yard. 

Hannah Bennett's grief over her brother was pitiful. To 
his last hour her home was his. Her tender hands minis- 
tered to him with all the devotion of her nature. 

William Wood was among the first breeders and best 
judges of fine horses Orange County knew. He was of- 
fered £400 for one team of colts of his own breeding — a 
fabulous price for those early daj\^s. It was refused, his 
love and pride in them being too great to allow him to part 
with the splendid creatures. This team was coal black, of 
great beauty, style and speed, and so perfectly matched they 
could not be distinguished the one from the other by a 
casual glance. He drove from his farm with them to New- 
burgh in early autumn, carrying a load of produce to be 
shipped by boat to New York City. He remained over 
night and started for home early next morning. In cross- 
ing a stream protected onl,y by a rustic bridge without a rail- 



156 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

ing, it was supposed the near horse, more spirited and met- 
tlesome of the pair, shied, became unmanageable and crowd- 
ed the other over in the water, dragging all with it. One 
horse and the owner were found dead in the stream by a 
near neighbor who made the trip at the same time, and was 
not far behind. The wagon was overturned upon him, 
causing his death by drowning. The news came swiftly 
to his home. Friends hurried hastily to the scene of the 
disaster, and he was borne sadly back with the remaining 
horse. James Burt, Esq., of Warwicl<, has told me often 
he stood in his father's door, saw him pass in the morning 
driving his fine team, and saw him borne back the next 
night in a large farm wagon, accompanied by a solemn con- 
course, the remaining horse led behind, slow paced, with 
drooping head, as if he felt the awful tragedty he had pre- 
cij)itated. 

My first visit to New York City was made with Mr. Burt, 
and on the Erie he pointed out to me the spot where the 
accident occurred, and related this incident. When all had 
been arranged for the removal of the body to his stricken 
home, it was proposed to drag the horse out of the way to 
a piece of woods, when a sturdy young farmer living near 
stepped forth. "No, boys," he said, "such a horse as that 
shall never be left in the woods for crow-bait. He shall 
have a grave like a Christian. No cur shall tear his satiny 
coat. Get your shovels and we'll go to work." A grave 
deep and wide was dug, the horse was laid in it, covered 
with green boughs, and the earth banked and sodded above 
him. His place of rest was long visible. His beauty is 
remembered down the ages. 

Poor Hannah, again bereft, laid the body of her adored 
husband by the side of Jonah. Father, mother, brother, 
husband had been torn from her life. She was left with 
four children. Sally, the eldest, married Lewis F. Ran- 
dolph; Martha married William Benedict, eldest grandson 
of Elder James Benedict; the youngest daughter, a very 



A SISTER AND A BROTHER 157 

beautiful girl, married Thomas Welch. There was a son, 
Jonah, named for his uncle. In the winter of 181 5 there 
was a merry party of guests assembled at the old stone 
house of James Benedict, where now stands the dwelling 
of Mrs. Laura Benedict. All was merriment — a jovial 
neighborhood gathering. A knock was heard at the door. 
It opened to a stranger, white with falling snow. He sought 
the sisters Sallie and Mattie, who were present, to tell them 
little Polly had died the day before at New Windsor, leav- 
ing an infant a few hours old. This babe, named Micah, 
was brought to Warwick and nursed by his aunt Mattie, a 
foster brother of her boy, William L. Benedict. Here 
was another adopted son of Warwick tO' shed honor on the 
roll of her brave soldiers. Enlisting in the Mexican War, 
he was in .some of its hardest-fought battles, and imder 
the command of Gen. Winfield Scott, "before the halls of 
the Montezumas," his leg was shot from his body. Recov- 
ering from the wound, he lived many years, a gray-haired 
veteran of that sanguinary conflict. Wild was our delight 
when we saw Micah gallantly wielding his crutches through 
the gate, and "sleep fled our eyes and slumber our eyelids" 
as he told around the hearth of Taylor and Worth and Scott, 
our brave generals; of the fierce battles, and of Santa Ana, 
whom they routed and thrashed to a finish. 

Micah Welch was one of the original 50,000 volunteers, 
and Hannah Bennett's fourth grandson. While visiting her 
daughter, Mrs. William Benedict. Hannah Avas one day seized 
with excruciating pain in hei foot ; the leg became useless 
and commenced withering. Physicians were summoned 
from the first, and finally in consultation decided it could 
be brought back to life and usefulness. Poultices of the 
biting Arum trifilUum were ordered upon it as hot as could 
be borne. In a short time this astoupding blunder of the 
bygone doctor had completed its work — the limb had to be 
removed. This was done at our home by Doctor Elias Coe. 
and another sorrow was added to the life of her who had 



158 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

been stricken so grievously, who had borne so bravely. To 
one so active to be crippled was a heaviy cross. She was 
ever a fearless, graceful rider, and she deplored the loss of 
this exercise. Two attached slaves attended hei faithfully 
and were never absent from her side. She was a gentle 
mistress and they loved her with devotion. Their names 
were Rosy and Dilly. Her health gradually failed and she 
passed away at New Windsor, but was brought to Warwick 
and laid by the side of her brother and husband and a little 
daughter, who^ died in infancy. Often as I have stood by 
that quiet spot I have felt as if the grass waving above it 
must almost whisper of the happiness, the struggles, the 
triumphs, the trials of this loving, loyal adopted daughter 
of old Warwick town. I trust I may yet see her beloved 
memorp,^ on something more enduring than a scribbler's pad, 
a publisher's pages. 

The rolling-pin of red cherry which Hannah carried in 
her pocket all her adventurous ride is a treasured memento 
in our home. Her children were charming raconteurs, es- 
pecially Mrs. Lewis E. Randolph. She used to tell many 
amusing stories of her childhood. Her sister Martha was 
equally interesting. Parents trained their children to exact 
obedience and reverence in those primal days. Sunday was 
a time of rigid discipline. After "meeting" they were 
obliged to sit around the table and read and study the Scrip- 
tures. Then an early supper, and to bed at seven. Any 
evading of strict Sabbath rules was punished by a supper 
of "suppawn and buttermilk," and to bed at five. Fiction 
was considered the very snare of Satan for the young soul. 
One day a friend lent the little girls the w^onderful life of 
"Mrs. Margery Two Shoes," the first story book they had 
ever seen. It was carefully examined by the parents and 
they were told thev might read it on w^eek days but iterer 
on the Sabbath. One hot Sunday they sat around the table 
reading by turns from the Bible, when in an awed whisper 
one of the three proposed getting "Goody Two Shoes" and 



A SISTER AND A BROTHER 159 

reading surreptitiously. The proposal was received unani- 
mously, and Sally read sotto voce to the others while the 
parents conversed on the porch. The day was excessively 
hot ; the walk to the old Baptist church had been dusty and 
tiresome. Elder Benedict's sermons were never deeply 
permeated with that quality — rare in old-time preaching — 
brevity. Finally two little heads went down on the table. 
They were Mattie's and Polly's. Soon they slept sweetly. 
Sally resolved to keep vigilant watch and read on. Alas ! 
she was not the first sentinel to sleep on the post of duty. 
For just a moment she allowed her head to go down on the 
old Bible. She knew no more until a hand was laid upon 
her shoulder. She raised her little sleep-dazed head to 
meet her father's grave, questioning eyes. The book was 
in his hand. It is a formidable volume, just three inches 
in width and four and one-half in length. It was printed 
in London. Alas ! the way of the transgressor is ever hard, 
and thus it befell these small offenders against parental law. 
Mattie and Polly were awakened. Some chord of pity was 
touched in the father's heart. He did not chide them se- 
; I verely. Hannah Bennett was born under the blue laws of 
early Connecticut ; William Wood in Holland in 1747. 
They consulted gravely together and decided the suppawn 
and buttermilk innst be administered. So for three con- 
secutive Sabbath evenings three little wooden bowls, made 
by old Waan, an Indian squaw living above Bellvale, and 
cunningly stained with juices of bark and berries, were set 
before these culprits. Such was the severely strict observ- 
ance of the Lord's Day by our forefathers. Reading this to 
a small guest one day her eyes lighted, darkened, fired. "Is 
that old times?" she inquired. "Certainly, my dear," was 
answered. "Did they cat that awful supper?" "Surely." 
Rising and shaking her curls : "Then I'm glad I wasn't born 
then." This history of Goody Two Shoes is a family treas- 
ure, well into its second century. 



i6o UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

Mrs. Fairfield, a Connecticut lady visiting Warwick, was 
the first to learn of the whereabouts of fleeing Hannah and 
her brother, for her Warwick friends had been loyal to her 
secret and never disclosed their presence among them. Mrs. 
Fairfield painted the father's sorrow and fruitless search 
for his lost children, and Hannah, happily married, sent him 
a kind message. He had other children and made no at-, 
tempt to regain his boy, perhaps deeming it best, with the 
elastic philosophy^ we are prone to develop when helpless to 
improve our situation, "to let well enough alone." Of all her 
descendants Mrs. H. K. Morford, her granddaughter and 
namesake, inherited in a marked degree her beauty. The 
same dark, bright eyes, fine carriage and high spirit were 
characteristic of her. She was said in her youth to be one 
of the most beautiful girls in Sussex and Orange counties. 

The spirit of this brave pair did not die with them. In 
addition to her grandson Micah's splendid record in the 
Mexican War is the worthy one of her great-grandson, 
Corporal Frank A. Benedict, one of the first volunteers of 
the Civil War. It was ever remarked that Frank was like 
his uncle Jonah — the same erect bearing and agile form, 
the same courage and endurance. Charles E. Benedict, an- 
other great-grandson, an elder brother of Frank, was also 
a volunteer. Commissioned to raise a company, he died of 
camp fever just as it was recruited. The Civil War vet- 
eran, William Wood, was her grandson. Guy Benedict, a 
great-great-grandson, served in the beginning of the Span- 
ish War on Admiral Sampson's flagship, the Brooklyn, and 
afterward at the final great battle of Santiago, on the Iowa, 
under "Fighting Bob" Evans. The well-known railroad 
man, Mr. John Morford, is her great-grandson ; Dr. C. P. 
Smith, the skillful and popular physician of Chester, her 
PTPat-great-grandson. 

William Benedict and Lewis F. Randolph, her sons-in- 
law, went to the conflict of 1812, awaiting orders to march 
on Long Island when peace was declared. When the time 



A SISTER AND A BROTHER i6i 

for the removal of her leg became imperative, she came 
from her home in New Windsor to Warwick to her daugh- 
ter, Mrs. William Benedict, to have the operation performed 
by Doctor E. V. A. Coe. She refused any opiate, declaring 
if she died she wished to meet her end in full possession of 
every sense. She bore the ordeal unmurmuringly, while 
her daughter was led fainting from her side. When all 
was over Dr. Coe, laying his hand tenderly on her pale fore- 
head, said, "You are a brave little woman." He did not 
quite express it. She was ever a hero! 



VII 

Warwick Weather 
and Celestial Phenomena 




VII 

Warwick Weather and Celestial 
Phenomena 



ONE may dispute that the weather has as 
large a part to play in the economy of human 
work, happiness and comfort as aiijVthing to 
which we are subject. It has ever been the 
fountain head of troubles seen and unseen, for 
is It not weather that gives baby the croup, scaring terrified 
mothers out of bed at uncanny hours, and Grandpapa extra 
twinges of rheumatism, whereat he groans dismally ? In 
cloud and storm does it not obscure the blessed life-giving 
sunshine from the poor consumptive and invite the per- 
sistent cough ; does it not lie in wait, with chills, fevers and 
woes innumerable at times, and suddenly unload them upon 
us until we aver, "Well ! this ought to make the doctors 
happy" ? It dries and burns, drowns and washes, blows and 
tears just as it pleases, and we can't help ourselves one bit, 
and neither could our own dear forebears in the days 
gone by. 

In 1814 occurred one of the most terrible droughts ever 
recorded in the history of Warwick. It lasted nearly half 
the year. Leaves dropped from the trees, curled and with- 
ered; grass was literally burned black, and fell to charred 
dust beneath the feet; gardens and crops were ruined; no 
fruit grew to perfection ; small wild animals and birds suf- 
fered from want of food and water. Residents of Orange 
and Sussex counties having cattle turned on mountain 
lands, weary of seeing the famished creatures agonized for 



i66 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

pasture and drink, shot them down, one wealthy New Jer- 
sey farmer slaughtering eighty. Wells dried and people 
carried water long distances for family use ; the roads were 
lined constantly with cattle driven to the creek and ponds 
where any water was found. A poor, half-crazed creature 
called Old Enos declared that, lying by the side of the road, 
he saw numbers of rattlesnakes, blacksnakes, pilots, adders 
and racers crawling from the mountain across the road to 
drink from the brook running by the old Sayer homestead, 
but as to the truth of this the narrator was not able to vouch 
to the writer. To corroborate his story he did bring to the 
village of Bellvale a rattlesnake with thirteen rattles he 
averred he killed while it was drinking at this stream. The 
creek was almost the only source of water supply left, and 
that was very low. 

On the night of the 27th of June no signs of rain were 
visible. The sun hung lurid and dismal in a smoky west, 
and many had begun to predict and really supposed the end 
of the world was come. Prayers were offered in the 
churches, but supplications seemed in vain — the heavens 
were brass. On the aforementioned night, just after twelve, 
suddenly a gentle rain began to fall, which lasted four days. 
Never before in Warwick valley was such joy unspeakable 
known. The clergymen in the village churches on the Sab- 
bath tried to frame prayers of thankfulness, but broke 
down in so doing and wept; sobs were heard throughout 
the congregation. Neighbor shook neighbor by the hand 
with warmer grasp than was their wont. Wives told wives 
how when their husbands heard the soft, small rain come 
gently pattering on the roof they could not credit their own 
trusty ears, but plunged hurriedljy out of bed to see if it could 
be true. One worthy citizen went out lightly clad, and 
remained so long his anxious spouse besought him to come 
in or he would "get wet." "Get wet ! get wet !" he retorted. 
"Praise God ! Betsey, I could wring my shirt now." An 
anxious father, living below Warwick, having a son residing 



WARWICK WEATHER 167 

at a place called i'ole Ridge, rose in the dead of night and 
rode there tO' see if the blessed rain was falling on his son's 
farm, and found that it was. It lell everywhere; the stub- 
born vertebrae of the most destructive drought ever known 
since Warwick was settled was broken. Late gardens were 
planted, fields looked over to see if anything could be done. 
The animal creation seemed to gain a new lease of life. 
Even ancient grudges (more common then than now, when 
men were closer to the old feudal time, during which neigh- 
bor fought neighbor) were literally washed out in the beau- 
tiful, beneficent downpour. During the four days, two thus 
under the ban of each other's ill-will met on the road. "I 
can't bold out after this," one cried, truly repentant; "the 
Eord is too good. I won't go against Him and let the sun 
go down on, m^- wrath any longer," and it is to be hoped 
they were friends forevermore after making up and shaking 
hands, wet with that blessed heaven-sent baptism. It is not 
believed that there were so many new fancies and theories 
in religious matters in those times as now, but one good 
dame, whose mind had probably been greatly exercised by 
beholding the family garden supply and potato patch slowly 
cremated, remarked to her minister, Elder Lebbens La- 
throp, who preached in Warwick from Oct. 25th, 1801, to 
May, 1819), in a doubting spirit, "When you prayed so hard 
for rain, why didn't the Lord answer?" "We were not 
readj^ to receive it, and He wasn't ready to send it," was 
the sententious reply. Perhaps the worthy minister knew 
of the two neighbors from whose hearts the drought burned 
the feud. The terrific parching of old Mother Earth was 
done, but the bitter effects were felt all the next winter 
severely. Pork was leaner, eggs scarcer, the family butter 
tub low, the strings of dried apples and peaches very brief, 
potatoes almost invisible, and in many other ways the strick- 
en town of Warwick remembered this awful visitation. 

In the summers and autumns of 1843 and 1846 other 
droughts fell upon Warwick, and. though not quite so long 



i68 UiNDER OI^D ROOFTREES 

or severe, were protracted, causing much suffering and in- 
convenience. Many of the hardships portrayed were hved 
over again^ and there was scarcity in all tlie usual produc- 
tions of the earth. Springs were dug in the borders of the 
creek, and families carried water therefrom to their homes. 
Farmers with teams drove into town with churns and bar- 
rels full, and presented it to suffering housewives to cleanse 
the family linen, for all cisterns were dry. 

One of the longest and most frightful electrical storms 
recorded in the last centurjy occurred at Warwick. Imme- 
diately after noon on a very hot day a sudden ominous hush 
and darkness fell on the town. The latter was so deep that 
fowls sought their roosts. For some time this strange dark- 
ened stillness brooded over the face of nature — it was ab- 
solute; not a leaf, not a breath stirred the air. Suddenly 
lightning began to illumine the heavens, and thunder to mut- 
ter. This increased until it became appalling. A vivid 
description of this storm was wont to be given by Aunt 
Sarah, an aunt of Capt. James W. Benedict, who lived and 
died in the old stone house. At its height she went to the 
west window of the homestead to survey the scene. She 
described the whole face of the heavens as like burnished 
copper. The lightning poured forth in streams, forked 
streaks and vicious zigzag bolts. The peals of thunder were 
ear-splitting and incessant. There was not much rain, the 
wind was not violent, but the blazing of electricity was as if 
the universe were on fire. Mr. Nathaniel Jones was then 
master of the village school. From this point he witnessed 
the storm and said he thought the Dutch Reformed Church 
and the old Baptist steeple were struck several times, but 
no accident took place of which there is record. He was 
kept busy in calming and reassuring the dismayed children. 
Timid persons were frightened almost out of sense and life, 
and aggravated cases of " 'sterics" were reported among 
the feminine portion of the community from fright. Feather 
beds, the ancient rock of refuge in severe thunder storms, 



WARWICK WEATHER 169 

were in much demand ; many huddled in the famil;)- closet to 
shut out the terrifying sight. An old resident gave her 
experience during this storm. Her husband was working 
on the farm of Mr. John Wood, on tlie back road leading 
from the village, and she was alone in her house, on a small 
farm near town. She said she was firmly convinced the 
last day had come, and the end of all things. Her children 
were at school, and she longed to fly there and look upon 
them once more, but was deterred by Uie awfulness of tlie 
bolts. Finally she drew a feather bed to the floor, rolled it 
around her, and awaited the end in silence and suffocation. 
Between four and five o'clock the violence abated, children 
fled gladly homeward, the "mdking time," said never to fail, 
was taken advantage of, and the scared denizen of the iso- 
lated farmhouse crept out of her feather bed, bathed in per- 
spiration, but happy to find the world still going round. A 
calm and beautiful night followed this appalling display of 
electrical forces, and no injury seemed done by it. It can- 
not be learned that in fury, duration or elements of terror- 
izing it was ever exceeded. 

A singular visitation of cold once fell upon the town, so 
curiously sudden and uncommon as to be worthy of note. 
Its exact or approximate date I failed (an unusual act) to 
record when it was related to me by one who nearly fell its 
victim, who had started to a ball at a hotel in Goshen the 
evening of its visit, attended by Mr. William Vandervort, 
of Warwick. A proprietor named Evans kept the hotel. 
The day had been quiet and not severely cold. The pre- 
vious night there was an abundant white frost. At about 
two o'clock the wind rose, and began to blow keenly. It 
increased in velocity, and, to quote the narrator, "Every 
fresh blast seemed ten times colder than the last." This 
grew worse and worse, until- the cold was terrible. Unable 
to go farther, so intense it became, Mr. Vandervort and his 
companion drove into a farmhouse beyond Florida and were 
safely housed. The reins before this had dropped from his 



I/O UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

hands, and she had grasped them_, and given him her mult 
to reheve him. When taken from their vehicle they were 
ahnost entirely benmiibed, and were forced to remain 
through the night. This wind blew until eleven o'clock the 
next da}'. Over one hundred fowls froze in and about War- 
wick that night. A horse perished standing in a barn ba,ck 
of the town. Vegetables froze in cellars, and residents re- 
mained up through the dark hours of this fierce, biting blast 
and heaped high the hearth to protect tliemselves from its 
effects. It is very doubtful if many thermometers were 
owned in Warwick at that time, so no record is handed 
down of the prodigious fall that invaluable instrument must 
have made. Barns, fowl houses and stables were not then 
the warm and cheerfully ordered enclosures they now are; 
fowls frequently perched all through the winter outside; 
cattle sometimes had no stabling. No wonder in such sud- 
den Arctic severity they succumbed and were found dead. 
A poor, hapless creature, illy housed near Sugar Loaf, was 
so terribly frozen he died from the effects of his exposure. 
To quote a resident of the time, "It seemed all in the winds." 
When the sudden sweeping blasts calmed the cold as quickly 
died away. The winter of i835-'36 has gone biy the name 
of "the hard winter" ever since. Snow commenced falling 
in iVovember, and with consecutive severe storms it accu- 
mulated to a great depth. The cold was unintermittent and 
excessive. W^oodcock, partridge, quail and various small 
game were almost utterly destroyed. Great inconvenience 
and much suffering were experienced by the inhabitants of 
Warwick. Business at times was almost at a standstill from 
the depths of snow that impeded travel. Children were de- 
tained from school, physicians could frequently not be sent 
for to patients, nor attend them if they were. Stock was 
cared for and kept alive with difficulty. At one time five 
bodies lay unburied in the township, the snovv^ being so deep 
that the last narrow home could not be prepared nor the 
dead transported to it. Among the saddest of these cases 



WARWICK WEATHER 171 

was that of little Christian Elizabeth Wood, who died a 
short way out of Warwick, on the road to Sugar Eoaf. Her 
parents owned no horse, and she was seized with illness in 
a blinding snowfall, adding tO' the great depth on the earth, 
and no doctor could be called, as they were literally "snowed 
in," The poor child died, was robed for her last home, and 
the parents waited for favorable weather for the funeral and 
burial. It did not come, and finally they found they must 
keep the little body indefinitely. It was carefully laid away 
in the drawer of a large bureau in a cold room, securely 
locked, and every night and morning the sorrowful parents 
opened the sad receptacle of their little lost one and looked 
upon her peaceful face. She was kept so over three weeks 
before arrangements for interment could be made. The 
bereaved mother was accustomed to relate how at last a 
strange clinging yearning grew upon her to keep the little 
beloved dead, frozen into marble loveliness, and she dread- 
ed to see the stress of weather abate that would bear it from 
her. When at last it was so that the child could be buried, 
she could scarcely be persuaded to give it up, and her grief 
was so excessive that she was ill from the elTects. 

Senator James M. Burt, of Ohio, related on his last visit 
to Warwick many incidents of this severe winter. He led 
a party of thirty men with implements for clearing away the 
snow to bury a well-known resident of Bellvale, in the old 
Baptist yard. It was a common thing to ride in a road cut 
out through walls of snow that rose above the rider and 
sleigh. There was little business and interchange of money. 
One old lady used to remark with indignation that she was 
unable to procure tallow for her candles, and that it was the 
first time in her life that she was obliged to use a lard light, 
poverty's own illumination. 

There was serious want from the utter inability to get 
"grist to mill," or to get it ground. One mother crushed 
wheat in a coffee mill to feed her children. Vegetables, se- 
curely stowed in cellars, every crack and crevice filled, kept 



172 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

well, whicli was one advantage of the heavy mantle of snow ; 
there was no loss from freezing, and this proved a blessing. 

Hymen, poor deity of many tribulations, had several un- 
lucky contretemps this Arctic winter. Where Cupid, all 
undeterred, had prepared the way, this graver and more im- 
portant god was ofttimes in hard and grievous straits. In 
an ancestral home in the vicinity of Warwick a wedding was 
on the tapis. Tables groaned in anticipation of all tlie good 
things the cellars held for them, and felt deep concern as to 
the strength of their much enduring legs ; the life-blood of 
turkeys and chickens crimsoned the snow ; the bridal trous- 
seau, in those days costing back-aches and tired eyes unlim- 
ited, had felt the prick of the last stitch, the forty-ninth pull 
of the final "trying on," and all was ready, when a Boreal 
blast arose, drifted the last snow and subsided for another, 
effectually blocking Warwick township. The night of the 
bridal arrived, but the snow that preceded it l^y thick and 
deep over all that small world. A few near-by guests, by 
dint of hours of shovelling, reached the scene, but when 
the appointed hour came neither bridegroom nor clergyman 
was there. At about nine in the evening the former ap- 
peared, but the much-needed and important functionary 
was not forthcoming, and a sad and disappointed party sat 
down to the disconsolate supper. The ceremony, held in 
abeyance, did not take place until a day after that, being the 
earliest opportunity the belated clergyman could be "shov- 
elled through" to the deferred nuptials. 

A lady in Warwick used to give an amusing account of an 
experience of that winter. Her first babe was about six 
weeks old and with her husband they set forth to visit a 
sister. The inevitable shovel was in its usual place under 
the seat, as drifts were constantly encountered that must be 
dug through. Her husband was out of the sleigh, vigor- 
ously dissipating one of these, when the horse, a young and 
spirited colt, took fright at a shovelful of snow, and started, 
throwing herself and infant out. The startled husband 



WARWICK WEATHER 173 

easily caught the floundering animal, and, righting the 
sleigh, ensconced therein his spouse, when with a shriek 
she cried, shaking her voluminous wraps, "Oh, where is the 
baby?" Sure enough, though "to memory dear," the pre- 
cious infant was "lost to sight," and, almost distracted, they 
commenced their search in the surrounding drifts. In vain, 
baby could not be found. "It is lost, killed, smothered," 
cried the frantic young mother, wringing her hands as she 
flung the drifts aside in vain search. At length a voice no 
mother can mistake was heard, and the youthful scion of the 
house was discovered, feebly protesting against its chilly 
bed, close down to the just visible top of a rail fence. It 
was promptly rescued, none the worse for its impromptu 
bath in the snow, and with relieved hearts their journey 
was finished. It was no unusual thiiig for choice and con- 
vivial spirits on their way home from the village taverns to 
sink in the drifts for a comfortable snooze, and a regular 
scouting party was sometimes started forth to keep an eye 
on these and rescue them from "the sleep that knows no 
waking." These are a few of the incidental and stern 
realities of the winter of i835-'36. 

The year j8i6 was the coldest ever known in this coun- 
try. It is remembered as the year without a summer. There 
were snow and ice every month. On June 17th a terrible 
snowstorm swept from New England to New York, in 
which travellers were frozen to death. Farmers worked in 
overcoats and mittens to but little purpose. Scarcely any- 
thing planted grew. On our home place were a number 
of fine fruit trees. The young fruit managed to get a start, 
when there came a freezing rain. Every cherry, pear, apple, 
plum and peach was encased in an armor of ice, and was 
literally shaved from the trees by a fierce, cutting wind. On 
the 4th of July ice formed an inch thick. There was great 
scarcity and consequent suffering during the ensuing win- 
ter. The grain crop was a total failure. 



174 UNDER. OLD ROOFTREES 

The year 1833 was remarkable for the most wonderful 
meteoric shower ever seen in Warwick. People of the ner- 
vous type were greatly frightened. Innumerable meteorites 
fell thickly throughout a whole evening. Some thought 
fire from heaven was about to destroy the earth, but they 
dropped harmlessly around. Many predicted all the stars 
would rain from the sky. 

In the fall of 1827 a wonderful celestial phenomenon was 
visible — a magnificent exhibition of the aurora borealis. 
Grand columns of light shot from horizon to zenith ; arch 
upon arch, beautifully variegated with color, rose against the 
heavens. This rare physical phenomenon appeared^ during 
several nights, and was a truly wonderful sight, said never 
to have been surpassed since the years 1772 and 1777, when 
wondrous appearances were observable in the heavens. The 
nights of December 6th and 7th, 1777, the whole sky flamed 
with intensely vivid crimson shafts of light of exquisite 
beauty, and people were up throughout them gazing upon 
the wonderful sight. 

The year 1807 was remarkable for the severest hailstorms 
on record. It was said a belt of hail passed over the coun- 
try and that hail stones fell as large as eggs. A horse was 
pelted to death with them in his pasture a half mile from 
Warwick, and young Iambs were killed in numbers. In 
the thirties a terrible hailstorm struck Warwick. Some 
houses had not a pane of glass on the west side left unin- 
jured by this storm, which lasted unusually long, with very 
high wind. From our own home ninety-six panes of glass 
were broken. 

On Tuesday, the 21st of February, 1882, it rained, hailed, 
snowed, thundered and lightened in a single day, and fin- 
ished by clearing off cold. In 1790, after a warm rain in 
early summer, portions of the country were literally alive 
with small frogs. It was said that the earth swarmed with 
them. A step could not be taken without crushing num- 
bers. They were very lively and of almost uniform size. 



WARWICK WEATHER 175 

Children gathered them by the apronful and threw them into 
springs near their homes. They gradually disappeared. 

In the spring of 1847 the Rev. P. Hartwell arrived in 
Warwick as pastor of the Baptist Church. He reached 
the town the second week in March, and fruit trees were in 
full bloom. It was said to be the earliest spring on record. 

Freshets of unusual severity have been known in War- 
wick. Three times in remembrance communication with 
the village at different points has been cut off by the vol- 
umes of water inundating the country; bridges were swept 
away, and families living beside the creek were carried in 
boats from their houses. The townspeople paddled around 
their cellars in washtubs, gathering the debris of family 
supplies, and one very youthful citizen was nearly precipi- 
tated tO' a watery grave from this impromptu boat while 
endeavoring to reach the family apple bin with a small 
brother paddling. 

The late Doctor T. E. Cooper, of Warwick, used to re- 
mark that the place was subject to the severest thunder 
storms, with the fewest casualties, of any he had elver 
known ; that he had inquired of the oldest residents and 
could find remembrance of but four fatalities by lightning; 
injury to buildings, animals and trees was also compara- 
tively infrequent. He was wont to give some graphic de- 
scriptions of storms faced while on his lonely beat over Bell- 
vale and Greenwood mountains to patients, when, with 
much ado, he guided his frightened horse amid the rever- 
berations and vivid flashes. A gentleman residing on his 
own farm near Warwick once discovered a curious freak 
of lightning. A bolt struck a fine, tall chestnut on his 
place, and, cleaving it asunder, literally reduced a part of 
the tree to shavings. Of these, some two hundred, from 
ten to twenty feet in length, lay scattered in all directions. 
No artisan could have shaved them with finer precision. 



176 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

Some of these were on exhibition in Warwick for a time at 
the Advertiser office, and attracted much attention. 

In the year 1853 there occurred an unusual number of 
violent rainstorms in Warwick. Two produced deluges, one 
lasting four days. A landslide took place on my father's 
farm, burying a fine piece of spring wheat under a pall of 
mud. A well on the place, thirty feet deep, overflowed 
twice. The academy was damaged by lightning. 

The winters of 1806 and 1807 were visted by snowstorms 
of unsurpassed depth. It once snowed five days almost 
continually. The snow accumulated until business was sus- 
pended. A colored family living near where the home of 
the late Mr. W. F. Dunning's residence stands were entirely 
snowed under in their lowly cot, and were obliged to be dug 
out. In the early twenties of the last century Warwick was 
visited by the most appalling hailstorm ever remembered. 
One stone fell on the Bradner homestead measuring nine 
inches in circumference. They pounded the springing corn 
to pulp, rattled the young fruit from the trees, threshed 
away the leaves, shattered windows, and killed and crippled 
poultry, Iambs, pigs and birds of tender age. Its destruc- 
tion was unprecedented. 

In the years 181 1 and 1812 shocks of earthquake were 
felt in Warwick. Once they were so severe the earth trem- 
bled. There were terror and excitement, and, as usual, pre- 
dictions of the end of the world. 

The hygrometrical changes of the atmosphere were ever 
of deepest interest to our forefathers. Their weather prog- 
nostics were legion. Among a host which I have gathered, 
this seems most fitting to be handed down. It is certainly 
comprehensive : 

The hollow winds be.sfin to blow. 
The clouds look black, the ^]^S9, is low; 
The soot falls down, the snaniels sleep, 
And spiders from their cohwebs peep. 
T.ast nipht the sun went pale to bed, 
The moon in halos hid her head ; 



WARWICK WEATHER 177 

The boding shepherd heaves a sigh, 

For see, a rainbow spans the sky ! 

Hark, how the chairs and tables crack! 

Old Betty's joints are on the rack. 

Her corns with shooting pains ' torment her, 

And to her bed untimely send her. 

Loud quack the ducks, the sea fowls cry, 

The distant hills are looking nigh. 

How restless are the snorting swine. 

The busy flies disturb the kine. 

Low o'er the grass the swallow wings. 

The cricket, too, how sharp he sings! 

Puss on the hearth, with velvet paws, 

Sits wiping o'er her whiskered jaws. 

The smoke from chimneys right ascends, 

Then, spreading back, to earth it bends. 

The wind, unsteady, veers around. 

Or setting in the south is found. 

Through the clear stream the fishes rise. 

And nimbly catch the cautious flies. 

The glowworms, numerous, clear and bright, 

Illum'ed the dewy hill last night. 

At dusk the squalid toad was seen, 

Like quadruped, stalk o'er the green. 

The whirling wind the dust obeys. 

And in the rapid eddy plays. 

The frog has changed his yellow vest. 

And in a russet coat is dressed. 

The sky is green, the air is still, 

The mellow blackbird's voice is shrill. 

The dog, so altered in his taste, 

Ouits mutton bones on grass to feast. 

The tender colts on back do lie. 

Nor heed the traveller passing by. 

In fiery red the sun did rise. 

Then wades through clouds to mount the skies, 

'Twill surely rain, we see 't with sorrow — 

No working in the fields to-morrow. 



VIII 



Drifted Down 




VIII 
Drifted Down 




\RIM1TIVB ''TRAMPS."— EvQ the county 
poorhouse was built, Warwick township hter- 
ally swarmed with what is now called the 
"tramp," but in early days dabbed "straggler." 
Many farmhouses kept a back door restaurant, 
and beds in some outbuilding for these unfortunates. Some 
were women, often girls with babes in arms ; the demented, 
lame, deformed, crippled and aged begged from house to 
house. The beds kept for them by the charitably inclined 
were seldom empty. Who that ever saw her could forget 
poor, stricken, half-crazed "old Biidget," who, never sober, 
fell face down in the tan-pit on the highway one night with 
her baby Mike in her arms, and, stupefied by her last drink, 
could only partially extricate herself, and was dragged forth 
by an early passer by in the morning with the babe dead in 
her arms ? With wild, insistent "keenings" fit to curdle the 
blood, over the little, still form, poor Bridget went melan- 
choly mad, and roamed ceaselessly. She ever carried tucked 
in her bosom a fragment of the little blue linen slip Mike 
was drowned in, and when she became partially intoxi- 
cated always took it out, pressed it to her lips with fervid, 
kisses and wept over it, heart-breakingly. Her hair was in- 
deed a glory ; all unkempt, uncared for, for days at a time, 
still magnificent in length, blue-black as a bird's plumage, 
wavy, tendrilly, it curled about her weather-beaten face with 
a grace no art could compass, and Avhen unbound fell almost 
to her feet, a furrowed veil. As she grew old, shimmering 
silver frosted it, adding to its beauty. 



i82 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

One windy night, in a heavy rain, Bridget appeared at our 
door. It was the evening of Election Day. She staggered 
to the fire, was given an easy chair and, huddling in it, fell 
asleep. Our mother, with the assistance of the kitchen girl, 
was stretching the homemade linen sheets. It was consid- 
ered desecration to put a hot iron upon them, as it destroyed 
their sweetness ; they were folded, snapped and pressed, then 
laid in lavender until used. As the sheet was snapped it 
aroused her from her doze. "Lord save us !" she exclaimed, 
angrily springing to her feet. "1 believe you've all been 'lec- 
tioneering." Gathering herself together, wringing out her 
dripping wealth of hair, and winding it around her head, 
she declared her intention of leaving. In vain she was urged 
to go to her usual bed. She firmly persisted, and started 
out in the beating storm. Three nights after poor Bridget 
was found dead, shrouded in her lustrous hair, face down- 
ward in a small pond near Monroe. She was drowned pre- 
cisely as she had drowned her baby many years before, poor 
little Mike, over whom she had wept so many piteous tears. 
Poor mother! 

Whining Betsy, whose one cry was "A little paper o' tea, 
ma'am, it's all me poor weak stummick'll hold," filled the 
dual role of beggar and wanderer all her life. Betsy's babies 
were perennial. One winter night on her way home she 
called for her usual tea, with a very new little one cradled 
on her arm. "When you have such a struggle to get along," 
said our sympathetic grandmamma (as she placed a package 
in her hand), "it seems hard to have another baby to care 
for, don't it, Betty?" The pale, weak blue eyes overflowed, 
she drew the little one fondly to her breast, replying with 
her inimitable drawl: "Well, ma'am, I didn't want 'er no 
how, but now I've got 'er, I wouldn't lose her for a new 
green silk bunnit with red ribbins." 

Ever vivid in memory is Patrick Riley, who froze his feet 
and lost his toes on a disabled sailing vessel pounding the 



DRIFTED DOWN 183 

icy seas six weeks between Ireland and America. Drifting 
to Warwick he wandered there, half mendicant, half worker 
in its farm homes. What a delight when we saw him com- 
ing up the road, for entrancing were his stories of fairies 
and bogies, leprechauns, and the magical folklore of the 
Green Island of beauty, song and glory ! I have heard a very 
few of the stars of grand opera, but never one that could at 
all compare with Patrick when lie sang, 

Her chakes was like roses. 

Her lips just the same, 
And swate as twin sthrawberries 

Smuddered in crame. 

Once there was an Irish knight 

Who loved a lady fair to see, 
And she had silver and she had goold, 

But the Irish knight, O, poor was he ! 

But "brave and bowld." Being "turned down," as we now 
say, by the cruel father, he rode up to her "windy" one wild 
black night, on a sthrappin' red horse, and bore her off right 
under his very nose. What a prize Patrick would have been 
in these days when "thrills" and "shivers" are in demand. 
How it rounded our eyes, and creepied down our backs, and 
made insinuating gooseflesh granulate our small bodies when 
he told, with racy brogue, the story of the two brothers who 
quarrelled over a bit of the "ould sod," till one clove the 
other down and hid his body deep, deep, "undther the very 
sphot they differed over." And the nixt night "the mur- 
therer, comin' home from a wake, was met in the path by a 
great white dog, wid eyes of blood, walkin' along on his two 
behint legs, who sazed him 'round the nick an' throttled him 
to death." And as he gasped out his last breath the white 
dog, "which was no dog at all, but a wraith, looked in the 
murtherer's eyes wid his own brother's, and hissed in his 
ear wid his own v'ice, 'I'm Tim's avengin' spirit.' " 

How I longed for a robe of sk\-blue satin, trimmed with 
swansdown, just like the one Patrick's mother used to wear 



i84 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

in "the stlireets o" Dooblin' thralin" six feet behint her. She 
was a lady ivery inch," he asserted; "discinded sthraight 
from the ivings in Munsther." One night Patrick stopped, 
unusually lame, and besought us privately under the locust 
trees to "ask the masther to let him sthay and rist his poor 
hubs of fate for a sason." His wish was granted, joyfully 
we flew to fetch him in, and he stayed and rested there three 
years, feeding the chickens, watching tlie toddling babies, 
and filling our ears with his songs and stories — as true, 
trustworthy and amusing a friend as ever children had. 

A son, Thomas, whom he "lift a slip uv a bye in Ireland," 
having grown to young man's estate, came over and bore 
his father away to New York City. There, kind Irish heart, 
ever true to its own, he cared for him tenderly to life's latest 
day. How we missed him none can tell, and I have ever 
had a mind to make a little book of his songs and stories, 
stowed away in memory. 

Silly Nick was always begging "a bowl of hot water an' 
a little sugar and nutmeg, to keep the chills out." When 
given it, he would retire to some comer, introduce into it a 
generous libation of applejack, and pour it down his throat 
with resounding smacks of satisfaction. 

Old Schoon, the mule-driver, was another character known 
to Warwick byways and highways. Driving down the storm- 
washed mountain way from the mines one day with a load 
of ore, he rolled from his wagon, and, to use his own pic- 
turesque vernacular, "busted his poll ag'in a stun," gradually 
losing his poor blunted wits. Ever after he wandered up 
and down, driving imaginary mules, which were forever 
balking with maddening pertinacity. Two of these, Sally 
and Pete, were exasperating to the last degree, and when 
all urging failed to start them, he would seize a fence-rail 
and wildly belabor the air, while oaths and maledictions 
amazing to hear rolled with the hoarse boom of thunder 



DRIFTED DOWN 185 

from his deep, hairy chest, over his immense sagging lips, 
out into the startled air. 

What actor ever had a more admiring audience than poor 
crazed Schoon, as the schoolchildren, books and dinner bas- 
kets in hand, clustered on fences and stumps along the way 
to see him belabor the invisible Sally and Pete ? 

Poor Charity ! grievously afflicted with St. Vitus' s dance, 
and so lightfingered she would stealthily appropriate the 
knife, fork and spoon she was fed with, haunted early homes 
with her weird presence. Once caught filching a spoon by 
Mrs. Hoyt, of Warwick, who had kindly given her a cup of 
tea, she was mildly reproved. Lifting her nervous, trem- 
bling fingers, she replied: "An' how can I help stealin' when 
me hands dances right at things unbeknownst to me?" 

The fields, the woods, the green highways of my native 
home for the "groves were God's first temples," still seem 
to eciio with the prayers of "Crazy Charley." On bended 
knees, with uplifted hands, sometimes with brimming eyes, 
he prayed. His petitions were all-embracing, all-compre- 
hending. Pie poured them forth for executives, for church 
and state, young and old, rich and poor, bond and free, sick 
and well. ' When he had prayed until breath and strength 
failed him, and frequently with a last pitiful downpour of 
tears, he would reverently bow bis head, clasp his hands, 
with that most pathetic of all gestures, with the palms out- 
ward, and finish, crying brokenly, "And m.ost. Lord, I be- 
seech Thee to have mercy on such a poor, wretched sinner 
as now dares to call on Thy great and holy name." His voice 
was earnest and musical, and had a pleading pathos. 

Farming out the poor of steady habits was a common 
custom and meagerly recompensed by the town. Frequently 
those of good report thus found settled homes and lived and 
died in them, attached and respected. Children, if likely, 
were bound out until eighteen. On leaving, after this in- 
dentured apprenticeship was completed, they were required 



i86 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

to be given by law two suits of clothes and a sum of money, 
and if worthy of it, a certificate of good character. 

The Orange County poorhouse, after its erection, was not 
in good odor with the old-time habitual wanderer. They 
seldom sought it of their own free will. When complained 
of and deposited there by the poormaster, they usually man- 
aged to flit again just as speedily as possible, and many 
tramped till death. A weak, shambling creature called 
"Foolish Henry" was found lost and frozen to death in a 
stretch of woods. Unless in the beneficent shelter of the 
asylum prepared for them, nearly all met tragic ends. 

How Elder James Benedict Came to Laugh Heartily in 
His Own Pulpit. — That this old-time clergyman had excel- 
lent control of his risibles and was a grave, rather stern- 
faced man, who held fast to every command between the lids 
of his old leather-bound, brass-clamped Bible, even to obedi- 
ence to the king, is well known by all his descendants. But 
once upon a time his gravity was wholly upset, and he burst 
out laughing in his own pulpit, eke his deacons and congre- 
gation laughing with him. A sense of humor is a saving 
grace, a gjift delightsome 'in this hard old world; and 
though, no doubt, when all was over, his natural sense of the 
fitness of things and his protuberant bump of reverence 
caused him qualms of conscience over the outburst, likely 
many of the cloth would have "gone and done" likewise, had 
they been witness to a similar contretemps. 

Near where the pleasant farmhouse of Mr. John Vande- 
voort now stands, it may be said in explanation of the above 
event, a roomy log cabin once stood. The spot was called 
"Root Holler," from the quantity of sassafras growing there. 
In it lived a free mulatto woman with an Indian husband. 
Old Tine was an early disbeliever in race suicide. Her 
family was numerous and kept coming. Among her chil- 
dren Avas one called Sorch, or Sorchy, probably a corruption 



DRIFTED DOWN iS? 

of the grand Biblical name of Sarah. The latitude and 
longitude o£ Tine's cabin becoming cramped in accommoda- 
tion for her numerous family, she, as was the custom of tlie 
day, put some of them "out," and Sorchy was assigned to 
the 'home of Mr. John Sutton. Her personal appearance 
was most striking. She was fully six feet tall, with the 
build of a gladiator, of herculean strength, and absolutely 
without fear. Of her utter lack of any sense of danger 
many instances are handed down by the Sutton family. One 
afternoon, being sent up to the mountain to pick berries by 
Mrs. Sutton, she came home toward night, her basket filled 
in one hand and dragging a young wildcat by the other, his 
head well battered. When asked how she dared attack hmi 
she replied : "No wil' cats won't eye me for nothin' ; he got 

a club." 

Once a bet was made at a hotel in Warwick that Sorchy 
could be frightened. A plot was laid by six young men 
ready for fun and mischief, and, preparing, they watched op- 
portunity to wavlay and put her to flight. But another party 
got wind of the project of the first and planned to rout them 
In turn. At length the occasion presented itself. Mrs. Sutton 
sent Sorchy to the village one summer evening with a basket 
of newly laid eggs to exchange for household supplies. She 
did her errand faithfully, and started for home as the shad- 
ows of night began to fall. As she reached a lonely spot 
adjacent to a stretch of dark woods on her way, six ghostly 
figures sprang forth wrapped in long linen sheets. Waving 
their arms and uttering dismal groans they approached her. 
But at this juncture six others, enveloped in black habili- 
ments, with wild alarum shouts that would have done credit 
to an Indian raid, charged down upon the first. The white 
robed, nearly scared out of their mischievous wits, broke, 
and, flinging aside the entangling sheets, fled in dismay to- 
ward the village. Sorchy, setting down her basket, had re- 
mained perfectly quiet, a wondering spectator of the scene, 



i88 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

biit as the terrified white clacls disappeared over the brow of 
the hill she burst into shrill screams of laughter and, clap- 
ping her hands, cried, "Run, run, white ghosts, black devils 
will catch you." When all had disappeared she picked up the 
scattered sheets, folded them and, tucking them snugly into 
her basket, went on her way. On reaching home, Mrs. Sut- 
ton was amazed at the linen and questioned Sorchy. "Oh ! 
some ghosts got chased by devils down ag'in^ the woods," 
she replied, "lost their clo'es, en I picked 'em up." The 
puzzled lady did not learn in a long time the truth of the 
story, for unimaginative Sorchy really thought they were 
veritable ghosts and devils. 

But the fearless wildwood girl was at one time on the 
horns of a dilemma for which her native courage had no 
resource. 

Elder James Benedict was holding a Sabbath morning 
service in the first Baptist Church in Warwick and Sorchy 
was one of his congregation. It was a warm summer day, 
and the doors were thrown wide open. Suddenly there ap- 
peared near the portal a huge sheep of the male persuasion, 
bowing and squaring as he stepped stubbornly forward, bent 
on entering. Sorchy sat near the door, and with character- 
istic impetuosity flew to the charge. "Shoo," she said, in a 
loud whisper, "shoo, ol' Buck !" and endeavored to drive the 
intruder back. He proceeded aggressively to enter, when 
she planted a foot staunchly each side of the door, mutter- 
ing, "You shan't come in here, this is meetin'." Lowering 
his horny crest, Buck made a dive at her feet, seated her on 
his broad, woolly back, and trotted straight up to the pulpit. 
Avhere he quietly stopped, his rider holding on to his wool 
with desperate grip from her backward seat. So paralyzed 
were the assembly with the turn of affairs that not one 
stirred, but as they took in the utter ludicrousness of the 
situation, Elder and congregation burst into an irrepressible 
fit of laughter. There was no avoiding the outburst. Some 



DRIFTED DOWN 189 

of the parishioners, coming forward, seized the impromptu 
steed by the horns, Sorchy dismounted, he was summarily 
ejected and driven off; but it is well authenticated that the 
remainder of the services was conducted shakily. 

Hoiu Daughters Pared at School. — On the left of the way 
on the road leading from Warwick to Bellvale stood the 
home of William Wood. In his family were four children, 
a son and three daughters. Their school district lay in Bell- 
vale. Over the roomy log cabin, then the hamlet's only seat 
of learning, presided a pedagogue of memory more infamous 
than the Simon of France. After a time Airs. Wood learned 
that her son was taught to write, while her daughters were 
not. Troubled by this omission as time went on, she finally 
called to see that it be rectified. Glaring at her, the high 
and mighty potentate who reigned over the little world with- 
in the lowly log schoolhouse thundered : "No, madam, your 
girls will never be teached to write by me ; it's bad enough 
to have a woman readin'. Don't you know there's nothin' 
so odious" (he said "ojus") "as a larnt woman?" Every 
Saturday night this pioneer instructor got exceedingly drunk, 
and lay so all Sunday, going to his duties Monday morning 
in the amiable mood of a hungry Bengal tiger. No reading 
of the Bible, nor prayer, nor singing of sweet child hymns 
for the little group who assembled for their daily routine. 
Instead, every pupil was made to "stand up" facing the aw- 
ful presence, and savagely thrashed all around. The ven- 
erable woman who told me this (one of his pupils) said she 
could bear it for herself, for she was twelve years old, but 
when she saw the cruel welts on the white neck of her little 
sister of six it almost broke her heart. The lapses of this 
pedagogue frequently occurred on week days, also, and when 
the little school gathered and found no teacher present, and 
the word went round that he was seen at the "still," they 



I90 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

waited till noon, then went sadly home, "and bitterly 
thought of the morrow." 

Town Meeting Day. — Town Meeting Day in old War- 
wick was a time of rough rorv'stering and fighting. A well- 
known citizen going down to deposit his vote in March, 
1825, was set upon by a voter in quarrelsome mood from re- 
peated drinks and compelled to fight him. He would have con- 
quered his attacker, but the latter seized upon his hair, which 
was long and thick, bore him to the ground, and holding him 
there gave him an unmerciful drubbing. He took it with- 
out protest, proceeded quietly home and the affair seemed 
forgotten. The next Town Meeting Day he went down to 
vote, and at the polls met his assailant of the previous year. 
Before starting from home he had thoroughly greased his 
head with warm lard. Thus fortified against the hair tac- 
tics of his aggressor, he proceeded to give him such a thor- 
ough dressing as wiped out the old score most effectually. 

Obedience to Parents. — The cardinal virtue of obedience 
it is believed was more universal in primitive times than 
now. We quote an instance surely worthy of handing 
down. Just out of the village dwelt a young couple lately 
married and settled in their home. The wife's widowed 
mother lived near by, and almost every evening the pair 
walked down to call on her. One evening the little wife 
had a cold and the husband went down alone. On inform- 
ing the mother of the fact, she said: "Tell her I say she 
must take a good dose of salts before going to bed — at least 
half a teacupful." The good man of the house retired and 
was soon soundly sleeping. The wife did up the few chores, 
got the salts, measured them out, went to the pail for water 
and found it dry ; husband had forgotten to fill it. The well 
was far around the house, the night dark and windy. She 
hesitated to go out and did not wish to awaken her sweetly 



DRIFTED DOWN 191 

slumbering spouse. For a moment she paused, then men- 
tally exclaiming, "I never disobeyed mother yet, and sha'n't 
begin now," she took the cup and ate the contents dry to the 
last grain. Mother was obeyed. 

Barly Dentistry. — The dentist was an unl<nown quantity 
in our secluded settlement. Every doctor kept a formidable 
instrument called a turnkey for pulling anticky teeth. A 
dentist's chair was unknown, and if the offending molar 
proved hard to extract, the sufferer was laid on the floor on 
his back, the doctor knelt beside him, pressing one knee in 
his diaphragm, and thus patient and tooth parted company. 
A resident of Bellvale used to relate that at one time being 
seized with a raging toothache, she walked to Warwick for 
the services of a doctor (let him be nameless), who ex- 
tracted the wrong tooth, broke her jawbone and so injured 
her that she was ill for many days. 

Deprivations of Children. — It is a common remark of the 
mothers of the present day that evenings after the home 
work of children is done the rooms look as if it had snowed 
papers. A hundred years ago a sheet of white paper was 
an unknown luxury to numbers of the little folk. I was 
told by an ancient dame, once a little farm lass, that in her 
school days she never had but one-half of a half sheet of 
white foolscap paper. This was given her by a schoolmate, 
Miss Henrietta Hoyt, daughter of Benjamin S. Hoyt, the 
postmaster, in exchange for a big red apple. She deemed 
it too precious for use, and, taking it home, laid it carefully 
away in the family Bible. 

Aunt Patty Minthorn and the Grandfather's Clock. — Aunt 
Patty Minthorn was one of those kind, helpful, capable 
maiden aunts who almost invariably in early days, when 
woman's occupations were limited, if bereft of the parental 
roof, drifted to some relative's home and there became right 



192 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

hand to the family. Who but Auntie could so gently smooth 
the tousled hair, find the lost cap and school book, mend 
stockings and mittens, doctor bruises and cuts, and ever 
have a piece of pie or cake ready for the hungry? 

Aunt Patty was settled in the home of a brother, with a 
bustling, driving wife, a family of nine children like the pro- 
verbial stairs, and work a-plenty. Here she cooked and 
cleaned, spun and wove, knit and sewed, and nursed the re- 
current babies with all the motherly tenderness of her fond 
old heart — for how often is auntie the true mother of the 
brood! Neighbors averred that her feet and hands were 
never still at one time. The old grandfather's clock, as it 
ticked away the hours, never found Patty's duties behind- 
hand or undone. She had reached her sixty-fifth year, when 
one night, after all the family had retired, she sat alone in 
the sitting-room, finishing a pair of blue yarn stockings for 
her brother. Patty was toeing ofif the last stitch with nim- 
bly clicking needles, her eyes often reverting to the clock, 
for it was almost ten — an unheard-of hour to be out of bed 
in those days — when suddenly before her astonished eyes the 
old clock stopped. Her ears could not discern a tick. Never 
had it done such an unheard-of thing before. Patty was 
aghast and called up her brother. Vainly he endeavored to 
start up the family timepiece. It obstinately refused to go. 
Was the old clock on a strike ? Aunt Patty dropped the last 
stitch, broke off the yarn, carefully fastened the end, stuck 
her darning needle in the ball, folded the pair together and 
handed them to her brother. 

"There, Joseph," she said, "your stockings are done, and 
I'm done. The clock has stopped, and I've stopped." 

"What do you mean, Patty?" he asked, wonderingly. 

"Just what I sav," she replied, quietly, and went to her 
bed. 

In the morning Patty did not come down in the usual 
small, dark hours to wrestle with fires and earlv breakfast. 



DRIFTED DOWN i93 

On going up to her room tq see if she were ill, she calmly 
replied to the inquiry that she was not, but repeated her as- 
sertion that she was "done." Vainly they endeavored to 
urge, to reason with her; she was indeed "done." She never 
lifted hand to toil more, but lived on many years in a state 
of perfect rest. It made no difference when the family 
clock tinker on his round started the ancient timepiece tick- 
ing with pristine vigor. Aunt Patty did not start with it. 
It was whispered she was queer, stubborn, contrary. Alas ! 
they did not know that the poor, worn brain had given out, 
and prompted no more the willing hands, the tireless feet, 
the kind old heart. 

The Feather Beds. — The feather beds of our grandams 
were literally mountains of downy softness and warmth. 
Going in her girlhood to visit a friend, a young lady de- 
clared that on retiring to the roomy "spare chamber" for 
the night, her eyes encountered a bed reaching nearly to the 
ceiling. In a few minutes in bustled the mother of the 
home, a notable housekeeper. Mounting on a chair she 
patted down the pile, remarking: "Now, girls, you'll sleep 
to-night on two of the softest forty-pound feather beds in 
the country." 

Quilts closely darned with quilting, and composed of 
pieces whose name was legion, covered beds. The pat- 
terns of these miracles of patient industry in early days were 
called by many high-sounding appellations, such as "Missis- 
sippi Valley," "Philadelphia Pavement," "Double Irish 
Chain," "Baskets of Fruit," "Bed of Tulips," "Cross and 
Crown," "Outspread Wings," and others too numerous to 
mention. They were generally composed of gayest colors 
and set with white. Folded over the foot of the bed, too 
precious for use, was the ever-present "Family Album 
Quilt." This was invariably made of bits of dresses donat- 
ed by female friends, and often a corner from a vest pat- 



194 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

tern of a male acquaintance. It was usually pieced in a 
pattern called "The Rising Star," and somewhere in the 
multitudinous rays was hidden the autograph of the donor. 
These album creations were dearly prized, reverently cher- 
ished and very seldom used. 

7^he First Set of Artificial Teeth. — The exact date of an 
occurrence that set every tongue in ancient Warwick wag- 
ging, and caused such a peering of eyes and craning of necks 
as was seldom seen, when the heroine of all the excitement 
appeared, could not be ascertained. Who that has sat in the 
pews of the old churches a few decades back, and seen the 
gentle, toothless mouths with their soft, sunken lips and 
peaceful lines, but recalls tliem with tender and reverent 
memories ; for up to a not far date many of our forebears 
refused the dentist's aid in rehabilitating their denuded 
gums. Of course it was a woman, for have we not been 
told from an old English writer down, that — 

Tliere's not a place in earth or heaven, 
There's not a task to mankind given, 
There's not a blessing nor a woe, 
There's not a whisper, yes or no, 
There's not a single life nor birth. 
That has a feather weight of worth. 
Without a woman in it. 

She was the sister of a physician, and, probably from tne 
heroic doses of calomel common to the day, became deprived 
of her teeth very young. After a while she journeyed to 
Newburgh, and from thence to New York City on some 
of the good sloops plying between. Returning after a pro- 
tracted visit of weeks, her lips parted in smiles of greeting 
to friends, and disclosed a perfect set of teeth. Great was 
the astonishment, wild the conjectures. Some, under the 
breath, averred a grave had been rifled for the fair mouth, 
others that a poor slave had parted with her snowy teeth for 
an alluring sum ; again it was declared an animal's grinders 



DRIFTED DOWN 195 

had been obtained and ground down. Others darkly hinted 
that the awful black art had been invoked and by its unhal- 
lowed aid a third growth had been called into existence; 
and so supposition ran riot. The raconteur who gave me 
the incidents of these artificial teeth, said to be the first 
known in Warwick, declared that she never heard one hint 
as to the set being manufactured. Any wajy, the owner 
wore them through her life, it was asserted, undoubtedly 
with just such discomfort and inconvenience as all of this 
latter-day experience when falling on such evil hap. 

Tight Lacing. — The extent to which tight lacing was 
practised by some of our grandmothers can scarcely be cred- 
ited. Here is a verbatim account of a young lady of War- 
wick robing for her first ball in the year 1826, and of the 
corset she wore. This instrument of torture was made of 
heavy homemade linen of four thicknesses, and fairly quilt- 
ed with stitching. The stays were shaved from ash wood. 
These were twelve in number, the front and back stays three 
inches in width, the others a scant inch. When this was 
placed upon the debutante preparatory to lacing her down 
for the trying-on of her first ball dress, one after another 
tugged at the lacer, a homemade haw^ser of hemp, to bring 
it together tightly enough to give the requisite slenderness 
to the girlish waist. At length the mother exclaimed with 
sudden energy : "Well, girls, we'll have to do as they used 
to when I was young, hitch it to the bedpost and let her 
draw nerself in." This was done, the panting victim strain- 
ing and pulling with all her strength until the awful vise 
was brought together, the stout ash boards meeting. The 
lace was then securely fastened, and the victim robed a radi- 
ant sylph in snowy muslin. This young lady was of plump, 
rather robust build. Let us not marvel at some of the plates 
in our early physiologies of laced, cramped and distorted fe- 
male forms. They were but pictures of the actual and real. 



196 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

An Irruption of Rats. — A curious visitation of rats fell 
upon our town in the early forties. It almost out-Pharaohed 
that much afflicted king. All at once people were awakened 
in the night by their wild scurryings through their domiciles. 
Cellars were raided, granaries and barns infested, and count- 
less hordes swarmed everywhere. A miller was attacked in 
the early morning hours in his mill in Bellvale and had to 
flee for his life. A farmer who had stored corn in a loft 
over his hogpen, on going up in the early morning hours to 
toss some down^, was so savagely attacked that he was 
obliged to call for help. He was bitten in the ears, neck 
and face by the vicious rodents. A housewife was awak- 
ened from sleep with a sharp nip in her nose, found it bleed- 
ing from bites, and on lighting her candle seven fled from 
the room. Children were attacked in beds and cradles, and 
finally so countless and fierce were the swarms that many a 
householder resorted to arms, watching through the dark 
hours pistol in hand. In our own home one night an army 
appeared. Two little brothers were attacked and bitten in 
face and ears in their truridle-bed. Our father, rising to 
get his pistol, was severely bitten in the foot while loading 
it. He shot eleven before daylight. They gnawed through 
every conceivable place, and fairly tunneled cellars. The 
homestead of Mr. Isaac Van Duzer, in Warwick, was so 
raided that the family were in terror of their lives ; also the 
vSmith hotel, on Main street. Various rat destroyers found 
their way to the stricken township, and finally exterminated 
the unv/elcome hordes, and alas ! in many homesteads left 
behind an odor not of "Araby the blest." An enterpris- 
ing individual concocted a plaster which he declared to 
be of such marvellous potency that, placed upon a rat hole, 
it immediately drew the tenants forth to its deadly surface 
and poisoned them with such Borgian suddenness and ma- 
lignity that they burst with a loud explosion, and were 
scattered over their own lintels. I have in my possession a 



DRIFTED DOWN 197 

fancy picture of this scene drawn by a wit of the clay with 
some lines attached, which read: 

Lo ! to relieve us came the famous plaster 
Invented by the worldwide chemist Tratt, 

Of all specihcs 'tis the very master. 
Sure death to every pilfering, burrowing rat. 

By putting one on runway or rat-hole 

It straightway blows their body from thuir soul. 

J\lany verses follow, equally ludicrous. The drawings are 
most amusing. The treacherous plaster is suspended over 
the opening of a runway, its lines dimly shadowing a leering, 
diabolical face, while the hypnotized rodents, with bulging 
eyes, are rushing unresistingly upon it, to perish in its death- 
dealing contact. The fatal explosion of the unfortunates, 
who are, to use a modernism, "up against it," is irresistibly 
comical, as an ear^ a wliisker, tail, foot or leg flies wildly 
into space. It was drawn by a descendant of the artistic 
Coe family. Dr. Elias Coe being one of the first portrait 
painters known in Warwick. 

Singing at Weddings. — The custom of singing, by the 
assembled guests, of an appropriate song after the ceremony 
was almost universal at old-time marriages. The following 
was recited to me by a Warwick lady born in 1817. It was 
sung standing by the whole company at her own bridal, and 
she informed me that she had heard it at many others, 
among them the wedding of Miss Mary A. Bradner to Sena- 
tor James M. Burt, of Ohio, at the old Bradner homestead. 
It was sung at the wedding of Emma Wheeler to Robert 
Penoyer and the marriage of Mary Burt to Joel Benedict. 
It seems to have been a favorite, doing duty on numerous 
occasions. It was called "The Bride's Farewell," and was 
quite lengthy, embracing the family circle, and the opening 
verses ran thus : 

Farewell, mother, tears are streaming 

Down thy pale and tender cheek, 
I in gems and roses gleaming, 

Scarce this sad farewell may speak. 



198 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

Farewell, father, thou hast loved me. 

Ere my lips thy name could tell, 
One to trust who may deceive me. 

Father, guardian, fare-thee-well ! 

Farewell, brave and gentle brother, 

Near and dear unto my heart. 
Friends, dear happy home of childhood. 

From ye all I now must part, 

and so on through lingering lines. When friends were 
about to leave home, it was very customary to have a family 
gathenng at some familiar place, and at the final parting 
for all to join in a farewell song. Standing about ten rods 
from the highway and nearly in the rear of the parsonage 
belonging to the Reformed Dutch Church, once stood a 
quaint yellow house with a flat roof surrounded by a low 
railing and fronting both the east and the west, with outer 
doors on either side. This was the home of Daniel Burt. 
In the thirties there was an exodus of Burts, Johnsons and 
other Warwick families to Ohio. At this old home was 
given a farewell party attended by over a hundred. As the 
guests bade a last good-by to those so soon to start on the 
then tedious western journey, they sang the following song: 

When shall we all meet again? 
When shall we all meet again? 
Oft shall glowing hope expire. 
Oft shall wearied love retire, 
Oft shall death and sorrow reign, 
Ere we all shall meet again. 

Though in distant lands we sigh, 
Parched beneath a burning sky. 
Though the deep between us roll. 
Friendship still unites our soul ; 
Still in Fancy's wide domain. 
Here shall we all meet again. 

There were many other verses, equally plaintive. From 
one who was present at this sad and touching farewell, I 
was informed it was sung with tremulos of grief and stream- 
ing tears. It seemed not to matter that the song was not 
always exactly fitting, it was what they had and they used it. 



DRIFTED DOWN 199 

7^he Molasses Candy Pull. — This was a favorite gathering 
of old. In a certain old stone house still standing, a merry- 
pull was held in the winter of 1828 by the daughters of the 
family. Gallons of molasses were provided. It was boiled 
in a big brass kettle scoured to sunny brightness, suspended 
from the crane. The stirring of tlie molasses during the 
boiling, by relays of lads and lassies, always brought two 
heads perilously near together. Two amusing events oc- 
curred at this pull. The first kettle was simmered to just 
the right consistency, poured in huge delft pie platters and 
set to cool outside the kitchen door, preparatory to pulling. 
A belated guest, a big, bashful young man, arriving late and 
wishing to slip in unnoticed, stole to the kitchen door — and 
planted feet of generous proportions in two of the dishes 
of cooling molasses. He was fast, his struggles heard in- 
side drew the company out, and amid shouts of laughter he 
was dragged in shod with his unique shoes. As was usual 
with the day, he was, with thoughtless levity, the target of 
fun and ridicule through the evening. A young gentleman 
at this party had woven a long braid of four strands of the 
candy. Among the guests was a girl with pale golden hair. 
Stealing up behind her, perhaps with intent to compliment, 
he foolishly wound the braid around her curly head, saying, 
"Lib, this is pure gold — just the color of your hair." It 
stuck to the yellow head, was disengaged with much trouble, 
she was very angry, a scene resulted, and it took the un- 
thinking guest many long weeks to reinstate himself in her 
favor. 

The Singing School. — The old-fashioned singing school 
was a joyful place for the young of early days. Sweet and 
luring to the athletic young men attending them looked the 
bright eyes and rosy cheeks of the girls in silken hoods of 
cherry, blue and white, tied snugly about their laughing 
faces. How they chatted and sung, and after the exercises 



20O UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

went home arm in arm through the village street, or two by 
two in the cosy pung, or in merry loads to distant farm 
homes, in the straw-filled "pig-box" behind sturdy horses, 
while they sang "Oh, the singing school, what a happy, 
happy place !" What a grand affair was the concert at the 
close, when the work of the winter brought down plaudits 
on the flower-wreathed heads of the sopranos, when the 
tenor and bass did their best, and the chorus came out 
strong! Once, after a very severe drought, it was thought 
the luxury of a singing school must be abandoned for the 
following winter, as money could not be raised to pay a 
teacher. On being informed of this, a many-daughtered 
mother remarked, "Oh, dear! then we'll have no engage- 
ments for our girls tliis winter, and no weddings next." 

Valentine Parties. — These gatherings were very much in 
vogue in early days, occurring from house to house ; some- 
times filling every evening of Valentine week. They were 
said to be the veritable hotbeds of love-making and engage- 
ments. Couplets and bits of verse were written and tucked 
in the pockets of the swains attending, and slyly found their 
way into the hands of best girls. Following are a few 
specimens of old time verse in honor of St. Valentine : 

Sweet memories 'round thee twine, 
My darling Valentine. 

Oh ! may our hearts in love combine, 
Then you will be my Valentine. 

If you love me 

Your Valentine I'll be. 

St. Valentine brings hearts together, 
No matter what the wind or weather. 

I'll no more peak nor no more pine, 
If you will be my Valentine. 

I've waited for this Valentine party 
To tell you of my love so hearty, 
And now pray tell me, frank and free, 
If you my Valentine will be ? 



DRIFTED DOWN ' 201 

To be born on Valentine's Day was considered a certain 
augury of a happy marriage. Frequently the dancing and 
merrymaking at these assemblages were kept up until day- 
light. On reaching home numerous charms were tried 
by the rural maidens. One was to fill a large bowl with 
water, set it by the bed, and on the surface drop bits of 
paper with the names of favorite youths written thereon. 
The damsel placing it, in order to give potency to the charm, 
was compelled to rise three times in the night, go backward 
to the bowl and turn it three times around. In the morning 
the name nearest her pillow was sure to prove her future 
husband. Ardent missives were often found tied to the big 
knocker of the front door, tlie daughters of the house rising 
early on St. Valentine's morn and taking them off before 
the eyes of parents or teasing brothers espied them. 

The malicious and wounding Valentine was little in evi- 
dence in early times, but a single instance is given showing 
that these unpleasant traits existed. In the township lived 
a girl of good family and fine character, born with a marring 
birthmark upon her cheek. She was wooed by a young man 
not in favor with her parents, and rightly as it proved. He 
was finally discarded, and took his dismissal with very ill 
grace. The next Valentine's Eve a letter was found lying 
on the doorstep addressed to her, with a rude picture of her 
face, the blemished cheek greatly exaggerated, and under- 
neath some personal and insulting lines. The young lady 
had a half-grown brother, big, fearless and very fond of her. 
He read the missive, straightway sought the cowardly of- 
fender and compelled him to acknowledge his offence, then 
gave him a dressing he was slow in forgetting. To com- 
plete his disgrace he was socially ostracized in the town for 
many a day. 

A Brother's Revenge. — In the old stone hotel built by 
Francis Baird in 1766 many dramatic scenes have occurred. 



202 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

One in particular is given from the lips of an eyewitness. 
A young man of excellent family became addicted to drink, 
causing his friends great anxiety and sorrow. One night he 
sought the hostelry and, after becoming partially inebriated, 
was seized upon by a number of revelers there, tied to a 
chair, and whisky forced down his throat until he was help- 
less. A brother, knowing his weakness, and missing him 
from home, hurried down to the village, surmising well 
where to seek him As the miscreants, five in number, 
stood over the almost stupefied boy, forcing still more of 
the liquor down his throat, the brother entered. Indigna* 
tion transported the usually quiet lad out of himself. He 
fell upon the party, tore his brother from their grasp, and 
seizing a heavy oaken chair, brought it crashing down in 
evei7 direction upon them. Before the astounded specta- 
tors could restrain him, he had laid four of them out, one 
with a broken arm, another with a fractured shoulder, and 
all with blows and bruises which caused them to remember 
their villamy many a day. He received no punishment for 
the vengeful rescue, and the occurrence was said to have 
acted as a deterrent to future scenes of the kind. 

Two Tragic Happenings. — The old corner hotel on Main 
street, long kept by Mr. Lewis F. Randolph, was the scene 
of two most tragic happenings. 

A ball was given one Christmas Eve, and a gay party of 
young folk came down from Goshen to attend it. Among 
them was a youthful wife, before her marriage the belle of 
her native town. It was an intensely cold night, and she 
carried her firstborn, an infant of three months, warmly 
wrapped in her arms. On arriving at the hotel she was 
taken into the landlady's own room, and laid her sleeping in- 
fant, enfolded in its wTaps, in ihe family cradle without 
awaking it. Then, seeking the ballroom, she was soon danc- 
ing with the merry throng. The little one slept so long and 
quietly that Mrs. Randolph at length went to the cradle, un- 



DRIFTED DOWN 203 

covered it, and put her hand on its face. It was cold 
in death, llie young mother, in her soHcitude to keep it 
warm, had smothered it on her own bosom during the jour- 
ney down. The scene tliat followed needs no words. 

The next winter another ball was given at the house, and 
a Goshen party again came over. A gay young mother 
brought her babe of six months with her. Soothing it to 
sleep, she laid it on the high-piled feather bed in the dress- 
ing room, pushed a tall old-fashioned bureau closely against 
it to prevent it rolling oft' and tlien sought the ballroom. 
Going up in the pauses of the dance to look at the child, she 
found it had awakened, crawled from the pillow, and, falling 
headforemost between the bed and bureau, smothered there. 
So overcome were Mr. and Mrs. Randolph by these consecu- 
tive painful occurrences that they declared they would never 
give another ball in the house. 

The Majesty of the Lazv. — An instance is given of the 
manner in which justice was administered in our town in 
the long ago. 

A family living on a small rented property between War- 
wick and Sugar Loaf was reduced by the death of the hus- 
band and father to sad straits of poverty. At length a pro- 
tracted illness fell upon the widow, and she was no longer 
able to support herself and children by her avocation of 
spinning and weaving in the farmhouses about her. In the 
tumbledown cot, with its bit of land, she struggled on, her 
cow, fowls and garden her only support. 

One morning, while preparing her children's scanty break- 
fast, she was horrified by the entrance of a myrmidon of the 
law who read to her an execution, seizing all she owned for 
debt. After the reading he straightway proceeded to strip 
the home of its contents. The fowls were then caught, 
their legs tied, and thrown on the load, the cow fastened be- 
hind and the worthy constable prepared to leave. As he 



204 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

was closing the door he espied on the fire a pot of meal 
boiling for their meager breakfast. Stopping short, he 
carefully scanned the paper, and remarking, "This 'ere exe- 
cution kivers everything, so it seizes the pot o' s'pawn too," 
he took it from the crane carefully, ensconced it on the load 
and drove off, swelling with the consciousness of duty per- 
formed. 

A Sighing Ghost. — Olden days were replete with luring 
ghost stories, for wliat would "lang syne" have been without 
them? Old servitors and superstitious visitors were always 
their chief vehicle. One lingers in memory that had an un- 
told charm and the "clink o' siller." Hard by New Milford, 
then called "Jockey Holler," stood a broad stone house in 
which dwelt a maiden "fair to see/' with a lover, of course. 
Life was slow and tedious in the hamlet with the sportive 
name, and finally the lover, weary of trying to make his way 
there to an establishment with the girl of his heart, resolved 
to go in quest of his fortune at sea. He started for the 
Mediterranean wuth a party bound there to seek mother-of- 
pearl. At their last meeting a silver sixpence was filed in 
two, a hole pierced in each half and tied upon either neck, 
the superstition of the day being that even against Fate's 
rude shocks the severed halves would come together again. 
Time wore on ; the absent lover was not heard from. One 
night the desolate girl lay weeping on her pillow, as love- 
lorn maidens have ever wept through the ages, when the 
heavy curtains suspended from the old tester parted, a salt 
breath of the sea floated over the bed, a cold white hand 
was thrust in, and the absent half of the sixpence she had 
cherished through all the years lay in her palm. 

The lover was never heard from more, and the stricken 
girl, faithful to his memory, became no man's wife. 

While the era of superstition lasted, in the lonely mid- 
night hours a soft, sad sigh, low, tremulous at first, dying 



DRIFTED DOWN 205 

away shudderingly, crept through the old house ; and this 
is surely true, for have I not, seen those who heard it many 
a time and oft? 

Stringent Bconomies. — That the early mothers were made 
careful by pinching experiences, and economizing to the 
verge of penuriousness, this little story will testify. With 
softly shaded lamps, gas and electric lights in almost every 
home now, it seems a fancy picture. All the luminary of 
olden days was the tallow dip, or a smoky lard lamp. Often 
when the candles ran low the tallow for dipping more was 
hard to procure out of "killing season." One candle was 
deemed sufificient to light the room for a family during the 
evening ; still we must not forget the gleams of the ruddy 
fire on the hearth that sent its glow to the farthest corner. 
A mother of those days related that she was one evening 
sitting with her husband and two children, when the latter, 
conning their lessons for the morrow, asked for a light of 
their own at the little table where they studied. Rising, she 
procured one and set it before them. Just as she did so 
there came a knock at the door and her mother-in-law en- 
tered. "Why, Emeline !" she exclaimed "what awful ex- 
travagance ; a whole candle for those two children to study 
by. I never heard of such a thing. I always learned my 
lessons lying flat on the floor before the firelight. Many a 
time the skin peeled off my forehead, and my eyes was a'- 
most burnt out o' my head, but I never got a light all to 
myself and neither must these children learn such wasteful 
ways," and, seizing the candle, she blew it out, carefully 
pinched down the wick and set it in the closet. Such were 
the economies of youth that made the easy chairs of our 
forebears' declining years. 

Lozv Po. — Whether from lonely environment or incessant 
hard work, brightened by little of change or beauty, is not 
known, but the old-time woman was frequently attacked by 



2o6 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

an ailment analogous to the one now dubbed by the elegant 
soubriquet of "nervous prostration." In primitive days the 
one alluded to was called "Low Po," and was quite common. 
Suddenly the most active and energetic housekeeper or busy 
mother of a family would lie down with this curious disor- 
der and often remain in bed for months. Its symptoms 
were various and puzzlingly contradictory. Some ate om- 
nivorously and talked incessantly ; some refused utterly to 
eat, just escaping starvation by the incessant efforts of 
friends to keep them fed; others maintained a sullen and 
aggravating silence, while some wept copiously and consid- 
ered themselves abused and ill-treated by all around them. 
In whatsoever form the complaint presented itself, its symp- 
toms were harrowing and annoying to the last degree to the 
unfortunate family of the victim. 

A case occurring in the midst of the village, of a despair- 
ing type, and every known means of rallying the patient 
having been exhausted, the physician in attendance informed 
the husband that unless stringent measures were adopted 
the young wife would surely die. The husband and doctor 
now laid their heads together to save her. For weeks she 
had lain in a seeming stupor a greater part of the time, only 
rousing occasionally to complain of hunger and that "tired 
feeling," which is of very ancient date. One evening the 
doctor entered and began whispering to the husband in the 
adjoining room. "I don't like to advise in the matter," said 
the good leech, in that penetrating whisper more distinct to 
the ear than the ordinary tone, "but there is no hope; all 
effort has failed, and you will be left badly off with a little 
family on your hands." 

"Of course," replied the husband, "it's a painful thing to 
think of marrying again before the breath leaves my wife's 
body, but this girl is very pleasing, will, I am sure, make an 
excellent mother to my children, and I think I best speak 



DRIFTED DOWN 207 

and secure her before another steps m and takes her from 
me." 

There was a stir in the bedroom, a violent fit of convulsive 
weeping-, and out of bed flew the patient Rushing up to 
her husband, she shook him soundly, shrieking, "So you 
think you will make arrangements to marry again before 
the breath is out of my body, do you? You'll put a step- 
mother over my children, will you ? Well, from this minute 
I'll get up and live to spite you!" She did, indeed, and 
went energetically to work at her old accustomed round of 
duties. At length the culprit husband confessed the trick 
he had planned to play upon her. She forgave him, but the 
doctor never, and it is handed down that both had the worst 
of the cure. 

Dancing in the Hog Trough. — I have failed to ascertain 
where the utterly ludicrous practice here set forth originated, 
among what nation, tongue or people, but that it was ob- 
served in our hamlets in very early days is the testimony of 
a great-uncle, who attended one of the gatherings on the 
mountain's foot late in the seventeenth century. 

In a family of daughters on occasions in which a younger 
sister preceded the elder to the altar, the firstborn left in 
the matrimonial lurch was duly notified that on a specified 
night her young friends would appear and invite her to the 
performance. 

This is the account of it as it was witnessed on the bor- 
ders of old Bellvale. A new, smoothly finished trough of 
ample breadth was brought to the house by a party of young 
folk. The girls of the company entering, seized upon the 
superseded daughter, and robed her in deepest mourning, 
with a long crape veil falling from head to feet. Weepers 
of crape streamed behind her. The trough was deposited in 
the middle of the room, and to the merry strains of an old 
colored fiddler, the girl sprang in and danced, while the 



2o8 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

party, clasping hands, circled around her singing. After a 
time a young man jumped in the trough, seized the devotee 
about the waist and danced with her. It was said this event 
was frequently followed by the early marriage of the girl, 
some tender hearted swain probably finding a soft spot in 
his heart for her, and resolving to spare her another Immola- 
tion. The trough was always presented to the family. 
Elder Williams, a Baptist minister who frequently visited 
Warwick in the early forties of the last century, and who 
was a Welshman by birth, declared he had heard the cus- 
tom was Saxon, but of this there is no corroboration. It 
would be most interesting to learn who brought it to our 
isolated hamlets in those faraway times. 



IX 
The Wawayanda Creek 



IX 



The Wawayanda Creek 




[HIS stream of water, the only one of its size 
to diversify the landscape, rises in New Jer- 
sey at a point about four or five miles directly 
south of what was once familiarly known as 
"Double Pond," now Wawayanda Lake. Its 
source is in a narrow valley, one of the hi^^hest lying be- 
tween the ridges of the Wawayanda mountains, and running 
northeast downward, a sluggish stream, it crosses the road 
leading to West Milford and Pompton a short distance 
north of where stood the toll-gate of the Pompton and Mini- 
sink Turnpike, so long attended by Albert Shaw. Here it 
winds through a black meadow. From the color of the 
water, it took the unpoetic name of Black Creek. 

Continuing its course along the north base of Rough 
Mountain, famous for huckleberries and rattlesnakes, it ac- 
celerates its pace over a more precipitous descent until it 
reaches the thrifty and romantic village of Bellvale, whence, 
after turning its mills and factories, it curves first to the 
northeast, and then west, where, in the meadow at the bot- 
tom of the Wawayanda Valley, it unites with the outlet of 
Wickham Pond, or Clark's Lake, and they together form 
the Warwick or Wawayanda Creek. Proceeding on its 
way to the southwest down the Wawayanda Valley into New 
Jersey, it strikes the foothills of the Pochunk or Pochuck 
range, a little north of Vernon. In the meadows here it re- 
ceives from the southwest the Black Creek, which has come 
from near Hamburg, and the united streams form the Po- 



212 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

chuck Creek, which turns at once to the northeast, and, 
flowing along the southeasterly side of Pochuck Mountain 
into the Drowned Lands, somewhere north of Pine Island, it 
unites with the Wallkill. This stream, rising near Sparta, 
N. J., flows along the opposite side of the mountain, on its 
way through Orange and Ulster counties, N. Y., until it 
falls into the storied Hudson, at Rondout. 

In connection with the fine old name of Wawayanda, let 
it be remarked that its smoothly flowing syllables seemed 
susceptible of as many and unique changes as any in our 
history. A single example is given from a varied assort- 
ment of original methods of spelling the time-honored ap- 
pellation. It bears on its front the dignity of years, and 
none will presume to question its authenticity: 

Mr. Burt: Sur, be plees to pay to the bare the wheat what you 
o to me fur a hat what is by hind and yu will me obleege till 
death. 

Theas frum yours to sarve, 

Aperl II day 1783 _ • 

To Mr. Burt Essquir. 

War war yender 

The ancient residents of Sussex and Orange were proba- 
bly unaware of the true derivation or meaning of the name, 
and the following legend was told of it : 

It ran that a Warwick townsman once did a poor, luck- 
less Indian, the worse for too frequent potations of fire- 
water, a kindness by rescuing from the penalty of some mis- 
deed his mortal body from "durance vile," and in return he 
engaged to disclose to his benefactor the whereabouts of a 
rich silver mine in the mountains. A day was set, and to- 
gether they started, when, on reaching the brow of a hill, 
this side of the creek (then densely wooded), the redman 
suddenly called a halt and demanded to turn into the village 
hostelry for a drink. Knowing his weakness, and fearing 
if he consented his guide would put himself in such a con- 
dition that he would be unable to locate the coveted treasure, 
the white man demurred and tried to urge him on. He en- 
treated and expostulated, and at length firmly refused to 



THE WAWAYANDA CREEK 213 

turn back to the tavern, reminding Lo of his promise, and 
also that an Indian never broke his word. Taking him by 
the shoulders, the redman turned his face toward the moun- 
tain, and, pointing with his finger, said : "Over water, wa^ 
way yonder," and, swiftly turning, strode out of sight. 

This tradition lends color to one local belief, that the 
name was the Indian's mutilated English for "way yonder." 

In the early part of the last century a strolling fisherman 
on the banks of the Wawayanda brought to the little hamlet 
the startling intelligence that two strangers were erecting 
a cabin near its banks. As Warwick village then contained 
but few dwelling houses, it may well be imagined the news 
quickly spread. A citizen of the town, named Crampton, 
engaged in constructing a lime kiln near the waters, soon 
brought the thrilling tidings that he had with his own par- 
ticular ears heard the pair conversing in a language out- 
landish and unknown, and the situation seemed to call for 
consideration and deliberation, almost as grave as aforetime 
seized our Dutch forefathers in events equall^v momentous. 
The land on which they located was owned by James Bene- 
dict, and his wife, going down, found a log hut constructed, 
two fine horses pasturing, or, rather, browsing, in the woods, 
and the little home almost destitute of necessaries and com- 
mon comforts, even for those primitive times. With neigh- 
borly kindness some needed articles were proffered and 
gratefully accepted in scant broken English by the woman, 
and, on being sent, were received with profuse expressions 
and gestures of thanks, and, owing to this generosity, the 
improm.ptu sylvan home took on a more habitable aspect. 
The crack of the man's gun was often heard in the wood- 
land, and they fished in the stream and gathered the berries 
growing in profusion. The isolated pair remained until 
late autumn, when the smoke of their log hut no longer 
curled above the tree tops. The home was found vacant, 
each article donated by neighbor Benedict left with scrupu- 
lous honesty. From frequent descriptions of them given 



214 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

me by an aged woman who often saw them, they were un- 
doubtedly French. Their personal appearance, polite gest- 
ures of recognition and thanks, as described, seemed to typi- 
fy this nation. With their departure, as quiet and unan- 
nounced as their coming, interest in them did not fade. 
They were said to have been seen in Sussex County, and 
that the man had applied for a situation as teacher in a rural 
school. Then they were reported as turning up in New- 
burgh, and that, disposing of tlieir horses there, they had 
taken passage on the good sloop Caty Maria for New York. 
The mother of the late Mr. J. M. Knapp, of Sugar Loaf, 
recollected when a child seeing the pair in the woods, sitting 
side by side beneath a tree, where they had been gathering 
the wild plum, that once grew in abundance in that region. 
She always recalled a vivid impression of their unusual 
appearance, and the woman's small and slender hands. 

Through the mists of years the mind vainly conjectures 
as to who these unknown visitors were, or whence they 
came. Were. they political refugees? Was the straight, 
dark-bearded head of the lone home an exile from friends 
and native land ? Was a crime behind them somewhere, on 
some foreign shore? Were they lovers, fleeing a stern 
parent's wrath, and an adamantine "No"? In those early 
days the unearthing reporter was unknown, and the investi- 
gating mania in its infancy. From all testimoniv it is not to 
be doubted that tliey were persons of birth and breeding; 
they came, they went, giving to the early dwellers a bit of 
romance to brighten the hearth, as neighbors clustered 
around in friendly visits on the wintry nights. Faithful to 
its trust, the good creek locked their secret in its breast, and 
never in all its babbling whispered it to mortal ears. A 
little spring, hollowed in the turf on the banks, from which 
they drew what was probably their only beverage, was visi- 
ble there for years. 

The rite of baptism, as administered in its waters by early 
Elders, comes as a rare picture to those who love to recall 



THE WAWAYANDA CREEK 215 

the familiar stream. It drew larg-e assemblages, and it must 
have seemed to every looker-on that Nature in gracious mood 
had formed that spot for the impressive ordinance. The 
gently sloping green banks, the graceful low reaching elms, 
the natural steps leading down to the water, the pastoral 
beauty, all about speak eloquently of the very finger of God. 

It is summer, a Sabbath noontide, calm and beautiful ; 
grouped on the natural terrace above the stream are those 
whom it was good to know. Neighbor chats with neighbor 
in subdued tones, friend with friend, as they await the pas- 
tor and candidates, who, in a humble house a short walk 
back, are putting on the quaint vestments set aside for the 
ordinance. But now, expectation is ended, and the revered 
pastor appears conducting those ready for the rite ; a hymn 
is sung, a fervent prayer offered, he carefully sounds the 
water, cane in hand ; then the solemn ceremony takes place 
and peacefully the gathering disperses, but on everny mind 
present an ineffaceable picture is left. Still the green banks 
and worn sod speak eloquently of those vanished footsteps, 
and the trees seem to murmur of those venerable heads, over 
whose lifted brows their shadows once played. 

The waters of Wawayanda Creek were not without their 
ghostly legend in early days, and it was awesomely told un- 
der the breath how a poor human, who found life in those 
primeval times too great a problem for his tired brain to 
solve, in one despairing moment ended all bty quietly letting 
himself down into the "deep hole," and thereafter at the 
approved hour for uncanny appearances, "his white face, 
looking black" (this is verbatim), would rise to the surface 
and long fingers would clutch at the tawny waters. Once 
it was affirmed that a small boy watching for muskrats 
heard this desolate ghost snoring loudly in his watery bed, 
and, fleeing home with hair on end, "musk-ratted" no more. 
The "deep hole" was a menace to the midsummer peace of 
many a Warwick mother, and in all probability this uhpleas- 
ant damp spirit was held in lively remembrance by anxious 



2i6 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

matrons, distracted by the wiles of venturesome small boys 
with a passion for running away to swim. 

For the benefit of the descendants of all such transgres- 
sors, this history solemnly avers that this ghost is still 
there, ready to grab any pair of runaway legs kicking about 
in its watery home, and that, being forever debarred from 
the luxury of hot towels, its clutch on young offenders is 
particularly icy, and its snore (when its cool coverlet of 
many waters is rumpled by pranksome limbs) quickly 
changes to horrific groans, fit to set every individual hair 
on end. 

It would gladden the hearts of latter-day Izaak Waltons 
withal, and cause their eyes to protrude, to draw from the 
Wawayanda such spoil as was the angler's harvest ere the 
iron horse on its diurnal way shook its bed, and bore to the 
once modest hamlet so many to indulge their favorite pas- 
time. What joy when the word went forth that the "suck- 
ers were running," and a spearing frolic was on the tapis ! 
The youngsters were enjoined to prepare the torches, and 
crotched sticks for impaling the prey were sought with 
alacrity. Surreptitiously we extracted a few billets from 
mother's precious pile of seasoned "oven-wood," and deftly 
we hid them in each bundle of fagots, to make them flame 
more cheerily. Then a bit of tow or flax was inserted in 
the bunch, for the purpose of lighting more easily, and when 
the eventful night came, and all was ready, old and young 
sallied forth. Over meadow and hill, till the rushing 
waters chime their familiar melody on the ear 1 A touch 
to the fagots, and the sport commences. Into the waters 
leap the "spearers" ; it is close work keeping the "lights" 
aright; but what youthful scion was not equal to such an 
emergency? Shins are barked, knees bruised by falls in un- 
seen pitholes, elbows and knuckles rasped, hair singed, 
clothes riddled by sparks, but soon the suclcers, great, shin- 
ing, firm-fleshed, splendid fellows, are flung on the banks. 
Proudliv the crotches are thrust through the pulsating gills. 



THE WAWAYANDA CREEK 217 

until each is so heavy with its burden that it is ready to drag 
its small, tugging carrier to the earth. Anon there is a 
commotion, a struggle unusual in the water. A stalwart 
spearer is making vigorous effort to land his prey ; but the 
tables are nearly turned by the writhing, lashing booty, 
and he is almost down again and again in the dark stream. 
Slipping, panting, he tosses it on the turf. "An eel ! an eel ! 
a whopper I" all cry ; not quite as long as the six-footer who 
lands it, but, of a verity, so extended that this generation's 
circumscribed bump of credulity would utterly fail to grasp 
its immensity, so it will not be specified. Cautiously the 
alert, excited juveniles seek to impale the big fellow; and 
when it is accomplished the boy to whose care it is assigned 
may be President, may be a general, but we dare assert he 
will never be so proud in the chair, or in the flush of vic- 
tory, as, when muddy, wet, begrimed, he set forth on the 
borders of his dear, native creek, dragging along the first 
eel, squirming and wriggling in his wake. In after years 
of struggle and toil, memory will perhaps recall no scene 
more picturesque than this — the somber, fringing woods, 
now gone; the dark, sparkling waters, the sturdy spearers, 
with strong bared limbs stemming the hurrying stream, 
faces intent and scanning, spears poised, and the perforce 
quiet, but happily excited children on the brink, bearing the 
shining spoil and fitfully flaming flambeau. 

The records of Orange County show that Mr. Frederick 
Dolson received deeds from the Master in Chancery, De- 
cember 7th, 1826, 50 acres ; July 8th, 1828, 17 acres. On 
this property he raised a dam and built a grist mill. This 
dam, it was declared, caused the waters to back up beyond 
the bridge, on the road leading toward Bellvale. From this 
Warwick was changed from a healthful locality to one 
scourged by agues, fevers and all their train of ills and ac- 
cumulated woes. Numerous deaths occurred, not only in 
the village, but on its bordering lands, and far down the 
stream even into New Jersey. 



2i8 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

Property in Warwick became almost unsalable ; in fact, 
the whole vicinity was affected. Showing the mortality it 
created, we append the deaths that took place in one limited 
familiy circle: Mrs. Sylvanus Fancher died July 19, 1828; 
her husband September 8, 1828; Mrs. John Pelton, a sister 
of Mrs. Fancher, January 18, 1829. The citizens of War- 
wick were justly alarmed and indig-nant. They were re- 
lieved from their fears and trouble in this manner: While 
the greatest excitement prevailed, and they were discussing 
measures for relief, a thaw came, producing a freshet. The 
millpond was covered with thick ice, and in the night the 
dam gave way. Traditions of a particular family grievous- 
ly afflicted by deaths, say that a young man was present at 
the dam at the beginning of the break, but that he made 
no outcry nor attempted in aqy manner to stop the flow. 
Public-spirited citizens now arose and vigorously declared 
that it was the time to get rid of the nuisance. Edward 
Welling, Henry Pelton and others decided it would be best 
to call a public meeting. Mr. Pelton penned a notice 
promptly summoning the townfolk to assemble ; but before 
the time arrived he was smitten with the prevailing fever, 
and, though dangerously ill, and confined to his home a 
long time, his vigorous constitution triumphed, and he finally 
recovered. A committee was appointed to ascertain wheth- 
er Mr. Dolson would dispose of the property, and for what 
sum. The result was that Frederick Dolson and Margaret, 
his wife, by deed dated April 20, 1829, conveyed to Na- 
thaniel Jones, Samuel Youmans, James Hoyt, Joseph Roe, 
George Morehouse, Henry Pelton and Daniel Olmstead, de- 
scribed in the deed as a committee appointed by the inhab- 
itants of the vicinity of Dolson's Mill Pond, by purchase the 
premises connected therewith. 

The area of the land, as therein given, was 66 acres ; the 
price paid $4,000. In the deed the Geraghty property was 
referred to as belonging to William Culver, probably the 
Culver who built the Reformed Church, the second pre- 



THE WAWAYANDA CREEK 219 

ceding the present building, and the second erected by that 
society. The committee raised the sum paid by subscrip- 
tion, and it reimbursed the subscribers by selHng- the mill- 
house and machinery to Mr. Van Valen, who removed them 
to and set them up on the property owned by Hezekiah 
Hoyt, and by selling the land to Mr. Ackerman, May 6, 
1829, reserving the full right to control the flow of the 
stream through the premises described in the deed. In a 
very short time Warwick regained, in its village and vicinity, 
the reputation for perfect healthfulness aforetime held, and 
which it has maintained to the present day. At the time of 
the breaking up of the dam numbers congregated at the 
empty pond and gathered quantities of fine fish from the 
pools of water left in holes here and there, and a gentleman 
of Warwick, then a pupil at the "Red Schoolhouse," declares 
he went with a companion to the empty pond, at the noon 
recess, and saw the fish carried away in large basketsful. 

These are the facts relating to the Dolson mill and pond, 
as accurately as could be gathered from data and remem- 
brance of those living at the time. Among tlie lamented 
at this sad period was Miss Benedict, second daughter of 
William Benedict. She was a teacher in the district so long 
presided over b(y Mr. McElroy, and was a victim of the pre- 
vailing chills and fever. 

When the memorable waterspout of '57 passed over War- 
wick Valley, James Burt, Esq., was crossing some land ad- 
joining the creek, and, hearing the commotion, paused to 
observe it. He found it was nearing the residence of Mr. 
A. H. Galloway, and aiming for the path he expected to 
take. Getting out of the way of the furiously circling ver- 
tical monster, he halted and saw it cross the creek. It 
churned the waters into a mass of foam, and, scooping them 
up, threw them to the very clouds. 

The annual "sheep washings," as thqy were called, were 
once familiar vernal sights in the Wawayanda, and the trees 
and banks blossomed with small boys gathered to witness the 



220 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

exciting- event. Each farmer bore to the scene a goodly kettle 
of family soft soap. This was plentifully smeared into the 
wool, and then, scared, trembling-, bleating piteously, they 
were shoved off the bank into the stout arms awaiting them 
and thoroughly scrubbed, till "white as wool" was no longer 
a misnomer. With bated breath each small looker-on 
awaited the dousing of that high and mighty potentate, the 
horned leader of the flock, who, belligerent, squaring, but- 
ting, resisting, frequently required two or three pairs of 
stout arms to shove off. But when there, how helplessly 
he shivered, gasped and snorted, and how bitterly he pro- 
tested when the biting lye soap offended his imperial eyes, 
once causing a diminutive boy on the bank to exclaim : 
"Now you've got it, old Buck, for butting me down in the 
orchard, and tearin' my new breeches." When chilled, 
tousled, utterly vanquished, he was tumbled on the bank 
to join his family, every perch, log, limb broke forth into 
shouts of exultation, for these old monarchs, once familiar 
figures in our pastures, were the terror of all marauding 
juveniles, whom they attacked pitilessly as they went berry- 
ing, fishing or rambling through the fields. The assault 
(with unparalleled meanness on the part of the sheep) was 
almost invariably made in the rear, and was particularly 
humiliating and aggravating to Young America, as torn 
trousers and bloody noses were the almost certain result. 
Any indignity, therefore, to this lord of the flock and past- 
ure was ever hailed with delight, as he was considered an 
inveterate enemy of the most atrocious stamp. 

The creek running through Bellvale was originally called 
Long House Creek, from the fact that the first settlers 
found there an Indian "Long House," a characteristic type 
of dwelling used by the famous Six Nations and their allied 
tribes, who were the aboriginal inhabitants of this part of 
the country. 

These dwellings were constructed hy driving posts with 
sharpened ends into the ground, binding them together with 



THE WAWAYANDA CREEK 221 

a network of saplings, and protecting the sides and arched 
roofs with layers of bark. They were strongly and com- 
pactly reared and formed the homes of congregated red 
families. This "Long House" was well known to the early 
settlers, and its ruins were visible for many years. 

Facilities for obtaining soft water being scarce^, even well 
into this century, the family washing was very frequently 
done along creeks, brooks and springs. While thus en- 
gaged in Bellvale, a young girl, on going to the stream for 
a fresh pail of water to replenish the huge brass kettle 
hanging from an impromptu crane on two crotched sticks, 
espied a gleam of bright color in a clump of alders on the 
brink of the waters. Thinking it a cluster of flowers, she 
pushed aside the overhanging growth to obtain them, when 
it proved to be the bodiy of a child, afterward Mr. John 
Clark, of Bellvale. She instantly drew it out, and, run- 
ning to Mr. Stephen A. Burt, that gentleman restored him 
to life, after a tedious struggle. Referring to the color of 
the little homespun woollen dress catching the young rescu- 
er's eyes, the mother was won't to exclaim : "What a mercy! 
what a mercy I colored that child's dress madder!" 

It will be observed in local history that two of the Indians 
who gave a deed for the land comprising Warwick town- 
ship to the first white owners had the syllables Wa-wa oc- 
curring in their names three times. 

Apropos of the name of Wawayanda, again we find these 
soft Indian syllables occurring in the pretty name of Wa- 
weewana, of whom we relate this legend: Aunt Fanny 
Benedict, mother of Major James W. Benedict, was Wa- 
weewana's little white friend. The Indian girl lived with 
her parents in their wigwam near the spring on the Colonel 
Houston farm. Her mother was Winapawnac. She made 
baskets to sell in the surrounding hamlets ; wove them cun- 
ningly of osiers and bark, and stained them with pokeber- 
ries, sumach and the juices, of barks, Man|>' a day little 
Fanny rambled by her side, helping her gather osiers and 



222 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

colors for her baskets, on the banks of the Wawayanda. 
Sometimes when poor Waweewana's father got the worse 
for firewater and brought neither fish nor flesh to the lonely 
hut by the spring, then there was chaos and confusion there, 
with the angry, hungry mother scolding the drunken father, 
dangerously fierce, and Waweewana would go over to the 
woods where Fanny's father was working, jump on the 
wood sled, and ride up to the house with her little white 
friend and get a good warm supper^ and remain until peace 
reigned in the lone savage home once more. The children 
used to dress their hair with the scarlet cardinal flower that 
grew in profusion on the banks of the creek, only Wawee- 
wana and her friend did not know the cardinalis by its high- 
sounding name, but called it "nose-bleed," and wove it in a 
coronal for their little heads as they played by the borders 
of the Wawayanda. 

More and more frequently the red father came home the 
worse for the sad firewater, and many a time and oft, when 
Winapawnac and Waweewana had made their baskets and 
sold them, dressed the otter, lynx and muskrat skins and 
got the money for them, he would steal or wring it from 
them, and it would all go for that which made him a raging 
fiend in the hut. So they became very poor. Waweewana 
took a heavy cold and gradually but surely faded into con- 
sumption. On the brow of the hill overlooking the winding 
Wawayanda stood a grand old pine tree, a veritable sentinel 
pine, and underneath it poor Waweenana used to sit, her 
back against its stalwart trunk, and cough her life awajy. 
She grew weaker and weaker as the golden autumn came 
on, and the creek murmured and rippled below her, and the 
great pine whispered above her head. Many a tear has 
dimmed my childish eyes over the sorrows of dear little Wa- 
weewana, and one of my first efforts at verse was perpetrat- 
ed upon her innocent head. 

Maybe she thought, poor, dying girl, as she sat by the 
waters, that the|y were telling in their low, murmurous 



THE WAWAYANDA CREEK 223 

tones, of that happy hunting-ground to which she was fast 
hastening. So, thinner and thinner, and more easily chilled, 
she lay down in the hut and died ; the woods, the waters, 
the sentinel pine knew her no more, and little Fanny long 
mourned her playmate. 

A grave was made not far from the stream and she was 
buried there. All was quiet^ hushed and beautiful when 
she used to sit by the waters and drink the bowl of warm 
milk brought by her little white companion — naught but the 
eternal anthem of nature, and the chiming ripples ; but now 
there is the iron horse on its thunderous round, and the 
twentieth century, with rush and rout, all, all so different 
save the Wawayanda, on its way imchanged and unchang- 
ing. 

In the deed of Thomas De Kay, dated 1724, the Wawa- 
yanda stream was dignified by the name of river and men- 
tioned as Bandon River. 

An exile from the "evergreen fields my fathers pos- 
sessed," no more cherished picture hangs on memory's walls 
than that of the years spent at the old Academy as pupil 
and teacher. In the hot days of summer we studied and 
botanized by the Wawayanda, only remaining indoors for 
recitations. Hew the young, bright faces come back ! The 
heads left are gray now. Many are far, far away in strange 
lands, and more, in the beautiful language of Whittier, lie 
sleeping in "that low green tent whose curtain never out- 
ward swings." 



X 
Henry William Herbert 

(" Frank Forester ") 



X 




Henry William Herbert 

(*' Frank Forester") 

T SUNSET one autumn evening a gentle- 
man on a spirited hunter drew up at our gate, 
sprang to the ground, and, drawing the rein 
'through the ring on the rustic tying-post, en- 
tered. He asked for a drink, the clear lime- 
stone water of the well being quite famous for its purity 
and coldness. Resting his foot on an Indian mortar that 
stood near, he drew down the old sweep, filled the bucket, 
balanced it on the curb and drank. He conversed a few 
moments with our father about the valley, the exquisite 
scenery tinged with the hues of early fall, and, bowing his 
thanks, rode away. As his hunter cleared the turn leading 
to the village, we were told it was Henry William Herbert, 
the English author. Frequently after, in passing our door 
at night, he called and drank from the well, and this was 
my first remembrance of him. His personality was strik- 
ing. He was erect, distinguished in appearance, with a 
hauteur and careless grace in every movement. His hair 
was heavy, waving and dark brown in color. He wore a 
mustache. His eyes were gray and keen, although I was 
told by one of his friends that his sight was defective. He 
had a charming voice, the tones musical and impressive. 
He sat his horse as if, to use an old-time saying, "he were 
born in the saddle." As his party tore up and down the 
stretch of road in front of our home, its most striking figure 
was Thomas Ward, on his good roan hunter, with his liver 
and white bird dog Dash at his heels — Tom, whom he right- 
ly described as "the largest heart, the wittiest tongue, the 
openest hand, the biggest soul in all America." 

Mr. Herbert was usually dressed in a shooting-jacket of 
rough material shot with colors, brogans on his feet and a 



228 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

frieze cap on his head. Mounted on the fine hunters he 
loved, with dogs of choicest breed following his erratic 
trail, he was an attractive figure as he wound through the 
Warwick woodlands. In manner haughty, even imperious 
when ruffled, when in good humor or engaged in entertain- 
ing conversation he was most engaging. His mustache 
was very heavy, and he frequently in talking twisted it ner- 
vously, sometimes thoughtfully. His hand was expressive 
— a capable hand, with long, white fingers and supple, rest- 
less movements. He would often pause on the porch, after 
drinking, and I recall an emotional warming of his cheek 
when he became interested and the darkening and glowing 
of his eyes. 

One evening a crow depended from his saddle bow. He 
said he had shot it to get the quills for pens to do some 
fine drawing. He was an accomplished draughtsman, rapid, 
skilled, and received a diploma from the New Jersey State 
Fair for drawings executed with a crow quill pen. Mr. 
Martin Kays, of Lafayette, informed me that he saw these 
drawings on exhibition and heard the admiration they elic- 
ited. From Mr. Kays I had many descriptions of Herbert 
as he hunted through Sussex, and of his feuds with the 
irate old Dutch farmers whose fences were razed and crops 
damaged by his retinue. 

Mr. Herbert was born in London April 7th. 1807. His 
father was the Very Rev. William Herbert, Dean of Man- 
chester, a son of the Earl of Carnaervon. His family held 
three patents of nobility. It was from this gifted father he 
inherited his versatile talents. The Rev. Mr. Herbert, in 
addition to his gifts as a clergvman, was a poet, linguist, 
historian and botanist. His richly endowed son brought 
him little comfort, and came to America in his twenty- 
fourth year to escape entanglements at home. Herbert 
was one of a numerous family of children, but three of 
whom visited America. An elder brother, an ofiicer in the 
Royal Navy, commanded a British steamer on Lake On- 
tario, and a jvoung sister once visited him at Newark. Tir- 
ing of the seclusion of the author's hermit-like retreat, she 
soon returned to England. 

Mr. Herbert was in every sense of the word a rarely 
accomplished man. His learning was thorough and com- 
prehensive. He wrote with a vigor and expression that 
made him famous. Who could fail to admire such pen 



HENRY WILLIAM HERBERT 229 

pictures as that of the caribou in "The Wigwam in the 
Wilderness," from the hunter's first sight of the wild^ beau- 
tiful creature to its submerging in White Falls, as it fled 
from the pursuing panthers. His vivid portrayal of wood- 
land scenes in America were not excelled in their time. 
Who but Frank Forester wrote of a "white-headed eagle 
rising heavily on sail-broad vans and oaring himself out 
through the intrenchant air over the limpid bosom of the 
waters." Or compared the mother summer duck and her 
brood to a frigate riding at her anchor with a whole fleet 
of pinnaces playing around her moorings." The robbing 
of the hawk of his black bass prey by the bald eagle and the 
death of the eagle by the gun of Tom Draw is a master- 
piece of description. His love of animals was a part of his 
nature, and some of his finest writings are of dogs and 
horses. His friend gave to me a vivid account of his great 
Newfoundland Sailor and his little pet Vixen in his home, 
The Cedars, and his love for them. He took Vixen with 
him to the hotel in New York, where he ended his life. 

Mr. Herbert was at one time Greek and Latin professor 
in a classical school in New York City. He had a rare 
gift at imparting knowledge and a wonderful flow of lan- 
guage. The almost musical sweetness of his voice was an 
added charm to his teaching. In French he excelled, and at 
one period of his life was in receipt of a good income from 
his translations of Eugene Sue's "Wandering Jew." His 
first novel "The Brothers," was issued in 1834. Such 
copies of it as found their way to country circulating libra- 
ries were literally read to tatters. Mrs. N. R. Bradner, of 
Warwick, whose literary tastes were marked, declared she 
and her husband rode manv miles to procure a copy, reach- 
ing home after dark. Mr. Bradner was equally fond of 
reading, and a friendly marital dispute occurred as to which 
should read the book first. She conquered, all honor to 
Mr. Bradner, and sat up all night reading it. 

Mr. Herbert was one of the fathers of woodcraft literature 
on the American continent. He told his friend the best 
paid piece of work he ever wrote was a "Carrier's Address." 
"The Warwick Woodlands" was originallv Dublished in The 
Twf. Ref^ister. edited bv George Porter. To our father Mr. 
Herbert deplored the lack of books of reference in writing 
bis historical novels. He said he could never ^et hold of the 
right book here. It was George Porter, at one time editor 



230 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

of the New Orleans Picayune, who suggested to Herbert 
the nom de plume of "Frank Forester." 

The original area of The Cedars I could not ascertain. 
Judge Deane informed me he thought it contained about 
three-fourths of an acre. Another Newark friend of Mr. 
Herbert told me it comprised four acres. The beautiful 
cedars environing the home in their grave, stately beauty, 
and giving it its name, were planted by the owner's hand. 
When a friend asked him why he almost exclusively planted 
this tree, he replied he loved "a tree ever green." Mr. 
Kays described to me Herbert's appearance at the State 
Fair of New Jersey. He was dressed in a suit of check, 
with a shawl of Scotch plaid thrown over his shoulder. 
One afternoon he came in on a black horse in a very elegant 
English riding suit, galloping outside the fair grounds for 
some time. 

The Cedars, situated midway between Belleville and New- 
ark, was an attractive spot in Herbert's day. Mr. Hugh 
Holmes, of Belleville, described it to me as a veritable bower 
of beauty, with vines, flowers and rustic embellishments, 
giving it a retired and romantic look. In this secluded re- 
treat he composed and gave to the world his best work. He 
had a wonderful memory, marvellously stored by study, re- 
search, travel and contact with master minds in the field of 
education, which greatly facilitated his exacting mental 
work. Manjy wondered that Herbert chose a dwelling place 
so isolated as The Cedars. He said he had three reasons 
for settling there — for absolute literary seclusion, easy ac- 
cess to New York City, and that the laws of New Jersey 
permitted the holding and convevancing of land by aliens. 
Herbert had unfortunate traits. He was impulsive, precipi- 
tate and easily angered. One unchecked remark made 
James Gordon Bennett his enemv and relentless persecutor 
throughout his life. In Ulster County I met a gentleman 
who was his friend and spoke with regret of this trait. Both 
of his marriages were contracted after brief courtships. He 
had known Miss Budlong but three weeks. His first union 
partook somewhat of the character of John Alden's. He 
called on Miss Barker at the re'^uest of a friend who> ad- 
mired her. fell ardentlv in love with her, and thev were wed- 
ded after a hasty courtship. After the coming of their only 
child her health rapidlv fniled, and she soon faded away. 
His Newark and Belleville friends gave me descriptions of 



HENRY WILLIAM HERBERT 231 

her portrait, which hung at The Cedars. It was a face and 
form of surpassing lovehness. Herbert used frequently to 
remark that no sculptor could do justice to the exquisite 
beauty of her neck, hands and arms. But alas ! his union 
with this lovely woman was most unhappy. His was that 
most to be deplored of all natures — capable of intense af- 
fection, but utterly unfitted to bring happiness to its object. 
He bore her pictured beauty with him from the lonely 
Cedars to the Broadway hotel where he prepared for his 
tragic end, and, with the sweet eyes looking into his with 
their gentle gaze, took his life. Herbert, in writing of him- 
self;, frequently alluded to his impulsive characteristics. "I 
am mjvself a quick shot — too quick, if anything," he said. 
Archer says he ever had to curb "his hot and impetuous 
nature on the hunt." He was singularly prone to put him- 
self in a false light. He says of his youth: "1 was a care- 
less, happy, dare-all, do-no-good." Instead, he was a close, 
hard student, first under the care of his accomplished father 
and tutors at home, afterward at Dr. Hooker's school at 
Brighton, finished a course at Eton, and graduated at Cam- 
bridge in his twenty-second year. His mother was a very 
lovely woman, the Hon. Letitia Allen, daughter of Viscount 
Allen, of Kildare, Ireland, of the Leinster family. 

His description of the horse was ever admirable. Here is 
one: "Clean-limbed, active, beautiful round quarters, proud 
crest, small head, a coat of high-polished copper." His de- 
lineation of the hounds, Spot and Chase, "drawing tlie 
bogs," and of Bonny Belle, Blossom, Dangerous and Daunt- 
less on the trail, are blood-stirring. One can almost hear 
the deep-mouthed bay and see the muscles grow taut and 
rigid. Fine as are his pictures of sceneriy, I have ever con- 
sidered them exceeded by his pen portraits of animals. He 
declared there was no charm for him like "learning the in- 
numerable and all wondrous attributes and instincts of ani- 
mated nature." After the freezing out of quail in the War- 
wick Woodlands in 1832, Mr. Herbert used his best efforts 
to stock them again, once bringing up two hundred and turn- 
ing them out in the region. Some of these were entrusted 
to our father's care. He fed them with grain, and they 
became very tame. During a summer which I spent at the 
historic old Van Cortlandt-Van Rensselaer mansion in Belle- 
ville, N. J., I learned that at the bicentennial anniversary 
of the erection of the storied home, no mention was made 



232 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

of Herbert's name. The address, delivered by Alderman 
J. F. Connelly, of Newark, referred to numerous promi- 
nent men and women, to Washington Irving; but Herbert 
so long a resident thereabouts, was strangely omitted. 
Around the Warwick hills and vales, the Wawayanda 
House, his memory clings unfadingly. Huntsmen, steeds 
and fine old landlord are of the past, but the wizard touch 
of the author's pen has made them live forever. Gone is 
the gilt pineapple on the pump, the signboard with the im- 
possible female figure, the rambling sheds where Sam, the 
great black ostler, with his bushy wool and shining teeth, 
reigned supreme. Good Roan and Dash are gathered to the 
hills that so often knew the impress of their tread. The 
round table, where Forester "and his merry men all" dined 
SO' joviality, where is it? The bedroom off the parlor he 
used to occupy they tell me is unchanged. How often have 
I watched Emma, the old black cook, picking game, her 
wool full of fluttering feathers. How many a night, after 
I became an occupant of his old room, did I almost feel his 
masterful presence at the portal. With the same pen he 
caricatured and idealized the generous host who made his 
stay bright in the Warwick Woodlands, declared "he had 
enough good in him to make five hundred men as men go, 
and was full of the milk of human kindness." In all his 
life he never wrote a truer word. To family, guests, ser- 
vants, retainers, old pensioners, Tom Ward's largess was 
unstinted. It was a memorable morning when I last visited 
the grave of Herbert. A terrific tempest had spent its force 
on beautiful Mount Pli^asant Cemetery the day before. 
Great trees were riven by lightning, twisted up by the roots, 
or hurled down, and the trail of the wrenching storm could 
be traced by scattered boughs and leaves. But the succeed- 
ing day was one of quiet, softly veiled beauty. Upon his 
grave not a leaf was stirred. A bird alighted on a shrub 
near and poured forth a wild, sweet carol. 

At the last visit of the friend who loved him well, he 
remarked : "How I should like to be with Tom at Warwick 
on those beautiful hills once more." It is said a more fit- 
ting memorial to the memory of this most remarkable man 
has been agitated. Should it ever take permanent form, 
let it be hoped the sad motto he left to be engraved upon his 



HENRY WILLIAM HERBERT 233 

stone will never find place there. The despair of poor 
human hearts should not be graven above the peaceful tomb. 



Judge Deane, of Newark, was an intimate and valued 
friend of Henry William Herbert, and was present at the 
last dinner given by the author and sportsman at his resi- 
dence, The Cedars, near the same city. These reminis- 
cences are gathered largely from the lips of this venerable 
and interestuig man, and to them are added others related 
by residents of the Warwick Woodlands, which he loved to 
celebrate by tongue and pen. 

Judge Deane held the opinion that biographers and penny- 
a-liners, anxious to color with the variegated hues of sen- 
sationalism his memonv, grievously maligned and misrepre- 
sented Herbert. The fatal step that led to his regretted end 
was clearly the outcome of a mind unbalanced by recent 
trouble. A close friend, some days before his death, had 
declared that his conversation and acts indicated unsettled 
reason, and expressed anxiety concerning him. In all con- 
nected with the affections and his domestic life Herbert was 
most unfortunate. After a residence of about nine years in 
America, he met the daughter of the Mayor of Bangor, 
Maine, to whom he was wedded in 1840 after a brief court- 
ship. She died in six years, and their married life was de- 
clared to have been most unhappy. A son, born early in 
their union, he sent to England after his mother's death, 
and he remained there. It was after the loss of his wife 
that Herbert's pen was most prolific. He seemed devoted 
to his work, and it was a surprise when it was learned that, 
after years of single life, he was about to wed a Miss Bud- 
long, of Rliode Island. 

To friends he expressed the highest anticipations of hap- 
piness in this union. He was at the zenith of his fame as 
an author, she was charming and wealthy, and his cup of 
joy seemed about to brim. The marriage took place in 
February prior to his death. The papers, private circles 
familiar with Herbert, rumor's split tongue, filled all space 
with the reasons for the almost immediate rupture of their 
relations. The friends who knew him best declared that it 
was his ardent wish to return to England, pay the debts that 
made him an exile from his home, and spend the remainder 
of his life there. He appealed to his wife to aid him with 



234 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

her fortune in doing this. Relatives who had opposed her 
union with the author suggested that his motive in the mar- 
riage had been to secure her weahh for the purpose he had 
indicated, and that he had no true affection for her. It was 
also hinted that a crime had driven him from England — a 
cruel falsehood; it was simply debt. She was angered and 
indignant, and in an interview told Herbert her fears and 
distrust. His rage was terrible ; she left him, and he vainly 
strove to win her back. She refused utterly to meet or com- 
municate with him. He seemed almost maddened by this 
overthrow of briglit hopes and fond dreams, and expressed 
himself as most wretched. In this state of mind he took 
his life by a bullet at the Stevens House, on Broadwa^v', New 
York City. 

His friend, Mr. Anthon, knowing his disappointment and 
unhappiness, had expressed grave fears of some such out- 
come of his sorrow ; also Mr. Picton, with whom he was as- 
sociated in editorial labors on the publications under his 
management. To those who accused Herbert of mercenary 
motives in marrying Miss Budlong, who fanned by cruel 
slanders the trouble that flamed up between them, if any 
such emotion as pity or remorse could find place in their 
hearts, it must have risen there, on reading the following 
poem, found lying on his desk after his death. It was said to 
be addressed "To Adele," his wife's name; but his friend, 
who saw the poem, says it simply bore the inscription "Come 
Back." As he had spent every energy of his life for da(\s 
in the one vain endeavor to win her to him once more, with 
no result, none who knew him ever doubted it was penned 
as the last agonizing appeal of a broken heart to her. It 
ran as follows : 

Come back and bring my life again. 

That went with thee beyond my will ! 
Restore me that which makes me man, 

Or leaves me wretched, dead and chill ; 
Thy presence was of life a part, 

Thine absence leaves the blank of death ; 
They wait thy presence — eye and heart; 

With straining gaze and bated breath. 

The light is darkness, if thine eyes 

Make not the medium of its ray, 
I see no star in evening skies. 
Save thou look up and point the way. 



HENRY WILLIAM HERBERT 235 

Nor bursting buds in May's young bloom, 

Nor sunshine rippling o'er the sea, 
Bears up to Heaven my heart's perfume, 

Save thou my monitor can be. 

There are two paths for human feet ; 

One bordered by a duty plain, 
And one by phantoms cursed, yet sweet, 

Bewildering heart and maddening brain. 
The one will right and reason urge, 

But thou must walk beside me there. 
Or else I tread the dizzy verge, 

And thou some guilt of loss must bear. 

Come back! There is no cause on earth, 

No word of shame, no deed of wrong. 
Can bury all of truth and worth, 

And sunder bonds once tirm and strong. 
There is no duty. Heaven imposed, 

That, velvet gloved, an iron hand 
Upon my heart-strings crushed and closed. 

Thy bate should all my love withstand. 

Days seem like ages, and, ere long. 

On senseless ears the cry may fall ; 
Or, stilled by bitter shame and wrong, 

The pleading voice may cease to call. 
Come back ! before the eyes grow dim, 

That keep but sight to see thee come; 
Ere fail and falter hand and limb, 

Whose strength but waits to fold thee home. 

It was believed by his associates that a copy of this poem 
reached his wife ; but it was never known whether such was 
tlie fact. If so, its pathetic appeal evidently elicited no re- 
sponse, and the "senseless ears," the hush of the "pleading 
voice," were invoked by his own hand. The sensitive, emo- 
tional temperament, combined with the poetical, as in Her- 
bert's case, was above all others the one to urge on to the 
commission of such a deed under the stress of heart and 
mental strain. That Mr. Herbert was naturally of a morose 
and unhappy nature his friends distinctly denied. To this 
frame of mind he was driven by the overwhelming anguish 
of his life. He was a poet of no mean order, and his "Bal- 
lads of the American Revolution" were remarkable as the 
outcome of the pen of an Englishman and grandson of an 
Earl and a Viscount. Their fire and sentiment would dp 
credit to the veriest patriot, and at the time of their publi- 
cation they were greatly admired. His genius was of the 



236 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

most wonderful versatility. In the field of romance he had 
high honor in his day. "The Roman Traitor," "Cromwell," 
"iVlarmaduke Wyvil," "Brothers" and "Wager of Battle" 
held an enviable place in fiction. He was but twenty-four 
years of age when he came to America, and made it his 
permanent home. He loved New York City, but for quiet 
in literary pursuits spent much time at "The Cedars," near 
Newark, From these two places he rarely went, excepting 
on sporting excursions wherever his fancy led. One of the 
most extended of these was made in the British Provinces, 
and his works on field sports and fish and fishing there are 
among the best products of his vigorous pen. 

Herbert was preeminently an industrious, faithful and 
most truly successful writer. His published works would 
comprise nearly sixty volumes were thqy all gathered and 
arranged. He would say of himself, "When out of the sad- 
dle I drive the pen." He boasted he had hunted and fished 
in every field and water of North America and the Prov- 
inces of Great Britain known in his time as worthy of notice, 
and it was literally true. 

While seemingly sporting he was an alert, wide-awake, 
keen observer, an eternal student, storing, garnering for the 
harvest of his wondrous pen. Mr. A. D. Patterson used to 
remark that would Herbert confine himself to magazine 
work he would excel any man living in that field. He hated 
its dull routine, and though he was willing and did engage 
in it, he would not submit to its inevitable bondage, though 
his fugitive articles given to the public through that medium 
are among the finest he ever wrote. His articles in Porter's 
Spirit of the Times were among the most interesting and at- 
tractive of all his work, and were eagerly perused by all 
lovers of field sports. 

To W^arwickians his "Warwick Woodlands" will always 
appeal most strongly. They find in it their own loved hills, 
woods, meadows and streams. The game he wrote of is 
delicious to their taste. Each nook and covert pictured by 
his pen is a familiar scene. They knew the old Ward House 
when it swung its sign-board merrily to the breeze, and wel- 
come and good cheer awaited all. It recalls most vividly 
the figure of the "Prince of vSportsmen" on his magnificent 
hunter, as he swept over the hills of Orange and Sussex with 
troop and whoop and hounds and guns, while Tom Draw 
at his side, with Dash, his liver-and-white bird-dog, started 



HENRY WILLIAM HERBERT 237 

the covey from the covert and broug-ht it down with un- 
erring- aim. Herbert loved Tom Draw, and of all the days 
of his life counted those happiest in the woodlands while 
sojourning at the old hostelry. 

He had the eccentricity of genius in a marked degree. 
He would speak with pride of his proud and aristocratic 
lineage, of old England, with tears in his eyes, and in the next 
breath berate it, its institutions, people, and assert they were 
a hundred years behind in all that made a nation. He 
would declare that in leaving England he shook its miserable 
clay from his feet, and that he desired to become an Ameri- 
can of Americans, and then criticise his adopted country 
with unsparingf sharpness. He hated the strict and formal 
method of rearing children in his native home, and had 
perhaps experienced something of its rigors from his own 
father, the Hon. and Verv Rev. William Herbert, Dean of 
Manchester ; yet he sent his only child, the ofifspring of an 
American mother, to England to be reared and educated, 
and through family influence gained him a position in the 
artillery service, where he early rose to the rank of Lieu- 
tenant. His editorials on America were unstinted in praise 
and admiration, so much so, that thev were asserted bv some 
not to be the product of his pen. For his mother he had 
the most passionate affection, and she, perhaps, of all with 
whom he was brought in contact, best understood her brill- 
iant, comet-like boy. He loved, while in Warwick, riding 
through its broad woodlands, to rein his fine hunter bv the 
side of some resident, and g^lean such information as would 
avail him for future use. He carried a note-book to which 
he was ever referring and addinf*-. He loved the horse with 
intense enthusiasm, and wrote a book called "The Horse and 
HorsemanshiD of America," which a reviewer, in criticising, 
said was so deep in research th^t it seemed the author must 
have made horses the one ?nd sole studv of his life. 

Though Herbert had in his aristocratic veins the blond of 
Earls, in his fine brain the "talents of angels," Tom Ward 
was no respecter of persons. He was truly one who would 
"shake hands with a king upon his throne and think it kind- 
ness to His Maiestv." In his hunts over wood and fell 
Herbert would, in hot pursuit of game, ride ruthlesslv over 
fields of grain, and scale fences, sending them scattering 
behind his horse's heels, until the farmers became verv in- 
dignant. His host would often berate him soundlv for this. 



238 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

with emphatic expletives, and roundly forbid further depre- 
dations. Once, after damaging a fine field of grain on a 
farm east of Warwick village, Mr. Ward declared he should 
go and ofiler reparation. He did so, and was politely re- 
fused. Returning, he said, "That farmer wouldn't take a 
shilling, and had the air and speech of a Duke." 

His nature was imperious ; the old strain of the Leinsters 
of Ireland and the Earls of Caernarvon was in him, and it 
broke forth often. A dramatic scene, in which he was one 
of the principals, was once enacted in front of the Wawa- 
yanda House, in Warwick. 

Accompanying his retinue one autumn was a party of la- 
dies, one of whom, a fair, graceful rider, robed in a sweeping 
habit of purple, frequently accompanied the English Nim- 
rod in his wild rides over the hills. Herbert had just 
brought some new horses to the hotel, and on this particular 
morning a groom was exercising one of them, a coal black, 
fiery brute, nervous and mettlesome, designed for a saddle- 
horse for the author. It was led up in front, where thf 
lady stood awaiting hers. In a spirit of reckless bravado 
Herbert ordered the groom to lead the animal up, and dared 
the equestrienne to mount him. She attempted, being a 
fearless rider, but the spirited steed reared and plunged so 
violently that she retreated and declared she would not 
mount. Grasping the bridle in his hand, and bringing the 
horse to a standstill, Herbert said, "Don't be afraid ; mount 
the devil, I say." Again she essaved, with like result, the 
plunging animal nearly trampling her down. White with 
anger, Herbert again commanded her to "get up," and 
oflFered to have her saddle put on the horse if she were afraid 
to try his, remarking, "I never saw you a coward before." 
The words stung the proud, baffled woman, and she burst 
into tears. 

Tom Draw, in his double chair on the sunny porch, had 
remained a silent spectator of the scene, but when Herbert 
thus taunted her to tears, he sprung quickly to his feet and, 
with commands forcible and emphatic, put an end to the 
trouble. 

Just beyond the village these two could frequentlv be seen 
clearing the high, slatv hills at breakneck speed, distancing 
their party entirelv, perhaps the two finest riders whose 
mounts ever snuflfed the breezes of the ridges. 



XI 

Grandmothers' Albums 
and Our Grandsires' Effusions 



XI 

Grandmothers' Albums and Our 
Grandsires' Effusions 




HE old-time album, with its acrostics, coup- 
lets, letters in rhyme, mottoes, and verse ad- 
dressed to its faded mezzos and woodcuts has 
[passed away. In it parents in round, precise 
hand inscribed solemn counsel to excellence 
and obedience in daughters, friends wrote formal addresses 
or merry ditties, and admirers recorded guarded eiifusions 
with due deference to the paternal eye. From the worn 
pages breathe the tender wish, the earnest prayer of heart- 
felt affection. They are not grand efforts, but bear the 
guinea's stamp and are true hearts' own coin. From over 
two hundred inscriptions copied and carefully preserved 
from these old relics I have selected the following. The 
date of the first album is 1824. Its owner was Miss Cor- 
nelia Ketchum, a Warwick girl : 

A woman old, with silver hair, 
Is sitting in her easy chair, 
Her girlhood's album in her lap, 
She dozes, reads, then takes a nap. 
Awakes and looks and says, "Dear me! 
It seems so strange, why let me see — 
Now was it — John or Dick or Chris, 
Or Ben or Dave who wrote me this?" 

Oh, when I read the gushing rhymes. 

Written by swains demented. 
In albums of their lady loves. 

With faded roses scented, 
I sigh me for the good old times 

Ere albums were invented, 
When knightly force took place of verse, 

In after years repented. 



242 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

The following is from the pen of a fond father to an 
only daughter: 

My child, when on these pages white 

Your eyes may sometimes chance to light, 

Remember, 'tis a father's quill 

Has sought good counsel to instil; 

And heed these words, my daughter dear, 

If you would prosper well while here. 

Oh, virtuous and obedient be, 

And practice likewise industry. 

After your mother pattern well — 

Her excellence no tongue may tell. 

Her qualities so good and kind 

Draw every heart in love to bind. 

Obey me, child, and peace below 

And bliss above your heart shall know. 

Do thy day's duty as the sun 

Shines thy lifted brow upon. 

Well remembering that to-day 

Nevermore can come thy way. 

Lines to a friend, with her picture, signed "Caroline": 

Accept, dear friend, this little gift 
And place it in your cherished book. 

And sometimes in lone, quiet hours. 
Upon its changeless features look. 

'Tis but the shadow of myself. 

The semblance of what soon must fade, 

And, dust to dust, beneath the clod. 
In still and dreamless rest be laid. 

And though no smile may light the face, 
Nor starting tear drop dim the eye. 

Nor tender words the cold lips frame, 
That 'neath the polished surface lie; 

It still may serve to bring a thought 
Of her who passed glad moments fleet 

With thee, of girlish joy whose spell 
Had for our hearts a witchery sweet. 

Though ruthless Time may dim these eyes, 
And plant my brow with lines of care, 

And strew amid my locks of brown 
Full many a thread of silver hair; 

Upon the one that meets thy gaze 

His iron hand no lines can trace, 
No tears can furrow the cold cheek, 

Nor sorrow dim this youthful face. 



GRANDMOTHERS' ALBUMS 243 

And may be it will live for thee 

When I have passed from earth away, 

The same young face that at your side 
Smiled many a bright and happy day. 

And if it bears the magic power 

To bring one memory sweet of me, 
I'll ever bless the favored hour 

That bore it with my love to thee. 

ACROSTIC 

Confined within this house of clay 

Is an mimortal mind; 
Oh, may it in the realms of day 

Eternal glories find. 
Revolving years but hasten on 

The time when it must fly. 
Despair to meet in pain and woe 

Or bliss in realms on high. 
Eternity — stupendous thought! 

Time that can never end — 
Let me through faith and knowledge find 

A Saviour for my friend. 
Imprint upon my youthful mind 

Thy precepts and thy laws, 
And let my happy resting place 

Be near my Saviour's cross. 
But should my mind on senseless joys 

Its richest treasures waste. 
Unfold thy beauties to my view 

And change my heart at last. 
Repentance grant for every sin. 

And let my garments be 
The spotless robes of righteousness 

Prepared, my Lord, by Thee. 

The "gray-haired boys" will, I am sure, read this with de- 
light. It was penned to a picture of a barn, just such a 
one as they have all played in : 

The old red barn behind the house, 

I see it lifelike rise 
Once more upon the grassy slope 

Before my boyish eyes — 
The weather-beaten, mossy roof, 

With each far-reaching peak, 
And such warm nooks within the straw 

To play at hide-and-seek. 



244 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

Once more I am a boy upon 

The hay loft broad and strong; 
I ne'er on earth shall see again 

Such poles so round and long, 
Or such green mows of new-mown hay, 

So fragrant, sweet and soft. 
Such clover heads and red-top gay 

As filled my father's loft. 

The wealth and bloom of meadows green 

Were in those hay mows sweet, 
They came from where the violets formed 

A carpet for the feet. 
They spake of April's smiles and tears, 

Of sunshine and of dew, 
Of gentle rains and zephyrs soft. 

And summer's skies of blue. 

How light and high we used to swing 

Above the rustling sheaves; 
We almost touched the martens' nests 

That built upon the eaves. 
There never was a place so smooth 

In all the world before, 
For rolling hoops and spinning tops 

As that old oaken floor. 

'Twas joy to watch the swallow brood 

On skimming wing far soar. 
When father brought at eventide 

The last load to the door. 
Upon his throne of golden sheaves 

A very king he seemed, 
While over all the harvest moon 

With yellow lustre gleamed. 

I see the gentle oxen stand 

With mild and patient look, 
And Crumple with her snow-white calf 

Drinks from the rippling brook, 
While from his stall gray Dobbin looks 

With many a stamp and neigh. 
Impatient for the bridle rein 

And gallop far away. 

'Twas here we shot the gobbler fierce 

With pop or water gun. 
And laughed to see him strut and fume — 

Oh, it was jolly fun! 
While Rover huge and little Trip, 

Barking with might and main. 
Forth started from her hanging nest 

The oriole in the lane. 



GRANDMOTHERS' ALBUMS 245 

'Twas sweet in rainy day to lie 

Safe in some hay-lined nook, 
And pore above the witching page 

Of weird, enchanting book, 
That told of knight and ladye fair. 

Of haunted lake and dell, 
Of fairy bowers and elfin sports 

And Eastern genii's spell. 

The old red barn, oh, who that played 

Within its raftered halls 
Can ere forget it, though to wreck 

The ancient fabric falls? 
'Tis linked with young life's sunny days 

In the old homestead home, 
Ere yet our thoughts had flown afar, 

Our feet had learned to roam. 



A GRANDSIRE'S LAMENT 

Of all the woes that ere befell 

A mortal man, grievous to tell, 

The worst that can beset his life 

Is a cantankerous, scolding wife. 

My friends, this case is my sad lot; 

Oh, would I ne'er had been begot 

To bear this grief and heavy woe. 

And all my days in sorrow go. 

She scolds at morn and noon and night, 

Beginning with the morning light. 

I cannot please her, not a grain. 

Although I try with might and main. 

Her tongue goes clickety clapper clap — 

Oh, that it should have been my hap 

To wed a stormy, fretful shrew, 

And all my days the error rue, 

For I'm a peaceful, quiet man. 

And bear it just the best I can. 

In 1861 a young wife inscribed these lines on the pages 
of her album to her husband : 

Beats there another heart, beloved. 
That feels for thee what mine has felt, 

Within whose fond and loving depths 
Thy memory has so truly dwelt? 

Beams any eye to gaze in thine 
That e'er such tears for thee hath wept, 

Has any other soul so fast 
And sacredly thy welfare kept? 



246 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

Smiles there another lip, dear one. 

Whose kisses fond are only thine; 
Do any other arms outstretch. 

Yearning thy form alone to twine? 

Listens there any other ear 

Ever thy coming steps to hear; 
Does any heart so quickly thrill 

When that loved footstep brings thee near? 

Is there a hand whose fast, true clasp 

Is never to another given, 
Or which so faithfully alway 

To smooth away thy woes hath striven? 

I read mine answer in thine eyes. 

Thy lips affirm it to mine ears. 
My heart is thine, and thine is mine. 

In bonds enduring through the years. 

Written in the album of an aged friend: 

I would not ask for thee, dear friend. 
Life's setting sun undimined by care, 

For such a wish and such a lot 

No mortal here on earth may share. 

But I would pray that peace and love. 
And faith and hope thy steps attend; 

Then thou niayst fear no storm of life, 
Nor shrink to meet its closing end. 

That this dangerous creature existed in the faraway days 
of our sires seems ahnost unbehevable, but she surely did, 
else why these 

LINES ON A FLIRT 

If there's a man pitied to be who treads this planet's dirt. 
It is the one who falls in love with a distracting flirt. 
My fellow countrymen, I chanced upon this dreadful case. 
And woe betide the man who looks on her deceitful face. 

Her hair is black, her eyes are, too, and snap and sparkle so, 
My head is dizzy and my feet have much ado to go. 
Sometimes by Jove and Juno, too, I'd swear she loved me well, 
The next she'd plunge me in despair too horrible to tell. 

She'd go with me to singing school and smile at Hiram Brown, 
And if I stopped and took her in while driving to the town, 
And hurried fit to break my neck to meet her waiting there, 
She'd be manufacturing dimples at a fool with two foot hair. 



GRANDMOTHERS' ALBUMS 247 

Her ankles are enough to set a fellow raving mad, 

And hooked on two 'o the littlest feet a woman ever had. 

And if a body tried to guess for forty mortal weeks, 

He couldn't tell which reddest were her cherry lips or cheeks. 

If I were partner with her at a party or a dance, 
Some other chap was sure to get her smiling, melting glance. 
She'd trip and turn so merrily, and lift her little skirt, 
While I was trying hard to grin as if I wasn't hurt. 

Now, by St. George, this thing I'll do, I mean to let her go, 
Although the very thought of it just bursts my heart with woe. 
For how I suffer, and how I feel, nobody'll ever know, 
For spite of all her tricks and shines, oh, I do love her so! 

A quiet, plain and homespun girl not far away I know, 
She isn't a bright and shining star, in fact 's a little slow. 
But she's got one quality to ease the bosom in my shirt, 
She never in her mortal days knew how to be a flirt. 

I'm going to ask her to be mine and settle down in peace, 
For from all flirting womankind Lord grant all men release; 
While water flows and green grass grows I'll never wish her 

hurt. 
Only that she'll just fall in love with a heartless he-male flirt. 

TO JULIA 

These await me somewhere, 

Prize of noble strife; 
Therefore bear I bravely 

With each cross of life, 
Reading still the lesson, 

Patience of the soul, 
Worketh to perfection, 

Gains the highest goal. 

Joy from weighing sorrow. 

Faith from blinding doubt, 
Strength from burdened weakness, 

Peace from conflict out. 
Pardon for rebellion. 

Rest from toil o'erspent. 
Knowledge from soul travail, 

Love and heart content — 

Somewhere in the future 

Beaming far away, 
Bides a better portion 

For my earthly day. 
Distant far it may be, 

Still its cheering light 
Gleams upon the present. 

Robbing half its night. 



248 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

Often premonitions 

Gleam from that far height, 

And renew my spirit 

As the dawn the light. 
In the night of darkness 

The soul's inner eye, 
With prophetic reachings, 
Sees the day is nigh. 

Speed, oh, days of bondage, 

Fruitless is your toil. 
Fly, oh, light-winged moments. 

Thankless is your spoil; 
Hope with buoyant spirit 

Bids me calmly bide. 
Patience hath its guerdon. 

Faith its wish supplied. 

TO MARY 

When the violet springs in the May 

I behold thy bright eye in its blue. 
The scent of the new-fallen hay 

Is not more delicious than you. 

The sweet pea bowed low on its stalk 

Is another fair symbol and true. 
As in beauty you modestly walk. 

Through the green meadows sparkling with dew. 

I can pluck the sweet violet and pea 
And carry them home on my breast. 

Oh, would I could so gather thee 

Beside them forever to rest. W. 

A picture of a typical country schoolhouse called forth 
this. It will find an echo in many a heart, recalling the 
old District School: 

Ah, well do I remember 

The schoolhouse old and small. 
To which each morn we journeyed, 

When happy children all. 
The long and rough hewn entry. 

With wraps and baskets hung. 
The upright posts and rows of desks. 

With slates and inkstands strung; 
The pail where we were watered all. 

The drinking cup of tin. 
That hung upon a nail close by 

The door we entered in; 



GRANDMOTHERS' ALBUMS 249 

The chair whereon the teacher sat, 

The blackboard and the chalk, 
The clumsy desk with many a hack, 

That did at old Time mock; 
The windows all too high to reach 

From which we tried to look, 
The long stove-pipe and poker bent 

In many a zigzag crook; 
The pile of wood, the ancient bell, 

That rung for work and play, 
The loving shovel and the tongs. 

Leaning so close all day. 
I've been a man for many years 

Out in the big, broad world. 
In various lands and distant climes 

My tent I've pitched and furled; 
But the memory of the old school-house 

Will never fade away — 
Oh, would I were a careless boy 

Beneath its roof to-day. 

ACROSTIC 

Fain would a friend his tribute pay 

Regardless of the critic's frown. 
And though his lines may go astray 

No other can them truly own. 
Could wishes for thy welfare prove 

Effectual for earthly bliss. 
Swift would thy moments ever move 

Along in purest happiness. 
May wisdom be thy constant guide, 

Each day examine well thy heart. 
Let there no room be found for pride 

In thy young thoughts to take a part. 
And should'st thou choose some worthy youth, 

With manly form and winning air. 
How will he prize that heart of truth 

If freely given to his care; 
That precious gift, oh, let it be 

Ever his own in purity. 

In the album of a little girl of ten is found these lines 
from the pen of a fond mother: 

Just as you are, a little girl, 

Long may my darling be. 
With never a thought of pride or show. 

Or frivolous vanity. 

I should love to keep her always so. 

But I may not have this prayer; 
I know if she lives she must some time go, 

To a woman's lot of care. 



250 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

So I'll hug this precious comfort close, 

When her years are done for play. 
That maybe in my mother's heart 

A little girl she'll stay. 

And though the winds of life may blow 

On her dear head rough and ill, 
In that safe place may I hold her close. 

And care for my darling still. 

TO SOPHRONIA 

Under the sky so blue 
No love than mine more true; 
Oh, be not coy nor cold, 
Now that my love is told. 

Think not when locks are gray 

My love will pass away. 

No, when thy form is bent. 

Still will its store be spent. J. O. 

Written to a picture of the new moon peeping over the 
shoulder of a young man standing on a bridge : 

I saw the new moon o'er my shoulder last night. 

"Which shoulder ?" you ask. Why, of course, 'twas the right. 

And I said to myself I will no longer wait, 

Fair Luna says luck, and I'll venture my fate. 

I want a dear hand to hold close in mine. 
The gift of that faithful clasp only is thine; 
I want one true heart to my own to beat time. 
And two willing feet with mine Life's hill to climb. 

And since yon bright silver bow with its soft light, 
Peeping over my shoulder declares it all right, 
The answer I wait for, I've only to guess, 
And you needn't mind speaking, I know it is — yes! 

From a teacher in the old Academy to a pupil leaving 

school : 

Lizzie, the dreaded parting hour 

Has come at last, no more we meet 
Within these dear familiar walls — 

Hallowed by schoolday memories sweet. 
No more you join the happy band 

Or enter in the old schoolroom 
To share in all its cares and joys. 

Fast fading in Oblivion's gloom. 



GRANDMOTHERS' ALBUMS 251 

When amid other scenes you go. 

With early friends to memory dear, 
Think sometimes of the moments bright 

Passed with the school friends gathered here. 
And grave each well remembered form, 

And each familiar, pleasant face, 
Upon your mind with impress deep 

That time nor change may not erase. 
Lizzie, I would amid the rest 

My own might claim one little spot 
Upon the tablets of your mind — 

Let not thy teacher be forgot. 
Tho' many a mile may intervene, 

And loving hearts perchance you find, 
Oh, often let a tender thought 

Rest on the old friends left behind. 
And when Life's fleeting dream is o'er. 

From Time's dim shores, oh. may we go 
To that bright land whose inmates blest. 

Changes nor partings ne'er can know. 
Warwick Academy, 1856. THY TEACHER. 

A CRADLE SONG 

Sleep, baby, sleep: 
The sun is in the west, 
Each birdling seeks its nest, 
Thou liest on my breast 
In blessed baby rest — 

Sleep, baby, sleep. 

Sleep, baby, sleep: 
Peeping all silver pale 
Forth from a snowy veil 
Of softest clouds that sail. 
The young moon lights our dale — 

Sleep, baby, sleep. 

Sleep, baby, sleep: 
Within the dim old wood 
Each flower draws its hood. 
And low bowed as it should 
Exhaleth God is good — 

Sleep, baby, sleep. 

Sleep, baby, sleep: 
A coverlet of red 
The loving eve hath spread 
Over the tired sun's bed. 
Hiding his golden head — 

Sleep, baby, sleep. 



252 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

Sleep, baby, sleep: 
Thine eyes white curtains hold 
Their blue within their fold, 
All fringed with rarest gold; 
My cradle song is told — 

Sleep, baby, sleep. 

ACROSTIC 

Heroes of old their ladye's charms 

Rehearsed in song and story, 
And many a doughty combat waged 

For sake of love and glory. 
Remembering that these valiant knights 

Were overcome by Cupid 
Removes a weight from off my heart 

That I, too, am so stupid. 
If knights of old could not withstand 

The rankling of his arrow, 
Excuse a youth of modern times, 

Shot to the very marrow. 
This heart of mine, tender and young, 

And glowing like a taper, 
Harriet has riddled through and through, 

Like perforated paper. 

Every time a wife scolds her liege lord true, 
A terrible wrinkle criss-crosses her face. 

She has only to smile, when, presto! perdue! 
Of crow's-feet and puckers there's left not a trace. 

FROM A MOTHER TO HER DAUGHTER 

If wishes could bring my darling 

Happiness, peace and love, 
I would ask the dear All Father 

From his beautiful home above 
To grant me such pleading for her; 

But I know it can never be. 
So I'll only ask Him this one. 

And pray He may give it me. 
To grant her a heart to bear well 

All the limitless sorrows here. 
Guided and strengthened forever 

By His presence true and dear; 
And when all, all is over 

That I may meet her where 
We can never lose our beloved — 

I think He will grant this prayer. 



GRANDMOTHERS' ALBUMS 253 

TO JANE 

Write? Yes, a whole volume, 

But it wouldn't contain 
Half the strength or the fervor 

Of the love I would fain 
Not confess quite so public; 

But there's no chance to hide it 
When pen, ink and paper 

All conspire to confide it. 

Oh, thou tale-bearing Album, 

That thus glibly dost steal 
What my lips in their silence * 

Would fain try to conceal, 
On thy pages so spotless 

Not a blush canst thou spread, 
To blot out with its crimson 

The soft tale ere it's read. 

All untold would I keep it, 

In my heart hid away. 
Till she sought it and read it 

And enticed it away; 
Then with rush of emotion 

From my lips would it fly. 
As a cage-released eagle 

Seeks home in the sky. 

Treacherous page thou'st revealed it; 

'Tis escaped, she may see 
On thy falsely pure features 

The message from me. 
Will it touch her young heart 

With a thought of my woe, 
When she reads 'twixt the lines 

All I wish her to know? 

AN ABSENT HUSBAND'S LOVE LETTER 

While sitting in an idle hour, my thoughts intent on home, 
The wish arose that I were there, no more abroad to roam. 
I long for my own fireside, its quiet, sweet content. 
And all that such a nameless charm to its surroundings lent. 

It is not that Earth's splendors are where my fond thoughts 

entwine, 
It is not there are bluer skies or suns that brighter shine, 
But that within that hallowed spot my heart can find and hold. 
The pearl of price, the gem of worth, pure Love's uncounted 

gold. 



254 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

For one is there who more than all is dear unto my heart, 
My own loved wife who seems to be of my own self a part. 
And never when before my God I bend the knee in prayer, 
Do I forget to ask that she may be His guardian care. 

What memories come of one sweet eve when hand in hand we 

strayed, 
And through the bending orchard trees the tender moonbeams 

played. 
While heaven lay about our feet, for love a pathway made. 
And guided both our willing steps beneath the chequered shade. 

I yearn beneath the locust trees to see our children play, 
To hear their voices sweet and clear ring on the air of May. 
And thou with fair babe at thy knee, a household angel blest, 
Art waiting at the hearth of home to welcome me to rest. 

Love of my life, my only one, I count the lingering time. 
That holds me from your presence dear in this far distant clime. 
I know the flowers bloom at home and budding trees are there. 
And long once more with you to breathe my own loved native 
air. 

For man may have uncounted gold and jewels rich and rare. 
May see his stately mansions rise and pierce the upper air. 
But he is poor, and starved his heart and desolate his life. 
Unless he owns that gift of God, dear children and a wife. 
Albany, 1847. 

TO A FORGET-ME-NOT 

Forget me not. 

Though changing years 
Be fraught with grief 

And dimmed with tears, 
Still in thy heart 

Keep one warm spot, 
And write thereon 

Forget me not. 

TO AN IVY LEAF 

I change, but in dying, 

Green ivy, tell 
If in my heart 

Thy message doth dwell. 

TO A DAISY 

He loves me, he loves me not. 

Tell me true. 
Which shall it be, Daisy, do? 
As I pull your petals and cast down, 

On my heart's hope. 
Dear daisy, don't frown. 



GRANDMOTHERS' ALBUMS 255 

TO A SWALLOW 

Fly away to mine own heart's love, dear bird, 

Fly fast on thy downy wing, 

And tell her the only little word 

Mine absent heart doth sing. 

Is tenderest love for her, sweet bird, 
And I would that its song she heard. 

REMEMBER ME 

Remember me, my friend; 

Though rivers roll between. 
And many a mountain peak 

Pierces the far unseen. 
Still in thy heart in some small place 
Oh, save for me a little space. 

TO A WILD BIRD 

Like a wild bird 

My thoughts of thee 
Go soaring far 

O'er land and sea. 
Then settle down at eve to rest 
' Beside thee in some dear home nest. 

An old time schoolgirl letter in rhyme, written at the 
Wawayanda House when used as a home for teachers and 
pupils of the Warwick Institute : 

Within your quiet room to-night, 

Oh, well-remembered friend and true, 

I sit beside the glowing hearth 
Sacred to memories sweet of you. 

The sparkling fire burns clear and bright, 
The well-trimmed lamp ditto, my dear; 

But, oh, some dust upon your stand 
Reminds me that you are not here. 

Memorial of your absence drear, 

I wipe it with a sigh away; 
So goes the world like grains of dust — 

We float awhile, then pass away. 

A half-closed drawer and book misplaced 

Proclaim the hurry of your flight, 
Your easy chair beside me leans 

Lonely and bare in vacant plight. 



256 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

Oh, where, I ask, the friendly form 

That filled thy ample depths, old chair; 

It only creaks with dismal moan, 
And echo answers, Where, oh, where? 

A basket small with half-closed lid 
Disordered on the table stands, 

A pair of gloves beside it thrown. 
Still bear the impress of your hands. 

A piece of ribbon by your stool, 
A little cushion minus pins; 

Your scissors on the window-sill, 
A gaiter string without the tins — 

All, all, proclaim you far away. 

While to my ear the night wind's moan 

Whispers that saddest of all words, 
To loving heart — alone, alone. 

Your little slippers on the floor 

Still further of your absence speak, 

While even the door as shut it swings, 
Gives forth a most lugubrious squeak. 

And I, oh, pen too weak art thou 

My desolation to portray. 
Thy pen-sive look and funeral pace 

Say just as plain as pen can say: 

That lonely is my heart to-night, 
And sad and sorrowful my lay, 

And absent she whose sunny face 

Has blessed this spot for many a day. 

But, lo! the clock strikes twelve; my lamp 
Burns dim and blue and smouldering low, 

Upon the hearth the fire fades, 

Bereft of sparkle, warmth and glow. 

Good night, sweet friend, may rosy dreams 
Visit your couch till morning light; 

I'm very sleepy, here's a kiss, 
Multum in parvo, so good night. 

ACROSTIC 

Soon as I heard my Saviour's voice 

In sweetest accents say. 
All worldly pleasures are but dross. 

Earth's riches pass away. 



GRANDMOTHERS' ALBUMS 257 

Religion is the only good, 

Its joys unmixed with pain, 
And those who taste its waters sweet 

Shall never thirst again. 
How vain appeared whate'er I had 

Most highly prized before 
Contrasted with a Saviour's love — 

How cold, how faint, how poor. 
At first my heart could scarce contain 

That love so vast, so sweet. 
That all that I had power to do 

Was to embrace His feet. 
Here while my contrite tears poured forth 

I felt how vile I'd been, 
And humbly asked His pardoning love 

To wash away my sin. 
Rivers of grace, I knew were His 

On sinners to bestow. 
If they, repenting of their guilt, 

Forsook the paths of woe. 
Now tremblingly I seemed to wait 

A doom severe but just, 
Each hope I had depended on 

No longer could I trust. 
Rising in awful magnitude 

Before my startled eyes, 
Alas, my sins appeared to view 

Of more than mountain size. 
Now hush! I heard sweet, cheering words, 

Which calmed each anxious fear. 
Despair not though in scarlet stains 

Thy numerous sins appear. 
Oh, trust in me, they shall be washed 

Like whitest wool again, 
Look upward to a Saviour's love — 

His blood removes the stain. 
Pure sovereign grace is rich, is free, 
Here is it poured for such as thee. 

A BROTHER IN CHRIST. 

ACROSTIC 

Had I prophetic power to look 

And read the page of future days. 
No joys perchance would grace the book, 

Nor pleasures greet my anxious gaze. 
Ah, youthful days, how soon ye pass, 

How blest could we prolong your stay. 
Sweet childhood's hours how fast, alas. 

All, all are vanishing away. 
Yet just, my Lord, is this decree, 

Richly thy mercies constant shine. 



258 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

Ever my heart look up and see 

Blest truth and wisdom both are thine. 

Under the rod I'll bow and pass, 

Remembering 'tis thy hands that hold. 

Thou wilt not let me faint or fall, 
But save me tried, refined as gold. 

Among the varied inscriptions in the venerable albums 
are found a few scattered In Memoriams. This is 

ON THE DEATH OF A MOTHER. 
Alas, dear mother, hast thou fled, 

Bade earth a long farewell? 
Asleep in Jesus' peaceful bed; 

Great God, thou hast done well. 

To bear her from a world of woe. 

Where joy hath little place. 
Unto the blessed realms above, 

Where she shall see Thy face. 

Although her gentle form we miss, 

And mourn our heavy loss, 
Oh, it is her most precious gain 

Bought on a Saviour's cross. 

Ye needy poor, well may ye weep. 

With such a friend to part; 
Her ready hands no more shall give. 

Moved by her generous heart. 

Oh, lonely home and vacant chair. 

And presence lost and dear. 
When shall the children of your love 

Forget to miss you here? 

Fare, fare-thee-well, mother beloved, 

We see thee now no more. 
But in the blessed realms above 

Upon the shining shore. 

How glad shall be the meeting sweet, 

Beyond the heavenly dome. 
Where tears and partings are no more, 

You wait to fold us home. 

OUR FATHER 

Our father has gone from the home of his love — 
How lonely the house and how vacant the chair! 

At the hearth, at the board, wherever we turn. 
We miss that dear head with its silvery hair. 



GRANDMOTHERS' ALBUMS 259 

It was here that we knelt in the evening to pray, 

Led by his voice in petition sincere, 
And here in the morning we greeted his face 

As his blessing arose for his loved ones so dear. 

Gathered at the old table he read us God's word, 
And joined in the song of thanksgiving and praise; 

How we listened at night for his dear coming feet. 
And sought who should be first the door latch to raise. 

A lonely, sad home and a desolate heart 

Is ours, bereft of a fond father's love; 
Oh, where shall we turn or where shall we go, 

Save unto our Father in heaven above? 

Our little boy is dead, 

Just three years old to-day; 
He would have been if he had lived, 
So soon he passed away. 
Dear, precious baby boy. 
Our hope and pride and joy. 

His empty cradle stands 

So smooth and still and white, 
Oh, can I e'er forget 

How all the happy night 
I heard his breath so soft, 
And waked to watch him oft. 

I hide my tears and try 

To bear my grief and pain, 
I know they cannot bring 
Our darling back again. 
But, oh, the lonely woe — 
I miss my baby so. 

They tell me not to weep, 

And cheer me with kind words; 
I see the budding trees, 
I hear the song of birds — 
But where, oh, where is he. 
With baby laugh of glee? 

I must, I must be still. 

Nor let my grief have way, 
I wound his father's heart — 
Oh, streaming teardrops stay, 

Make a glad rainbow for mine eyes. 
And through it let me see the skies. 



26o UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

TO A FRIEND IN RETURN FOR A LOAF OF BREAD 

Dear good friend of mine, 
You can never opine 

How delicious I found your bread. 
With the taste in my mouth, 
I declare north and south, 

Among bakers your place is up head. 

It is sweet, it is light, 
And toothsome and white. 

And from now till the day you are dead 
I hope no worse fate 
Will befall your estate 

Than to eat your own excellent bread. 

E. L. R. 
When the ear is dulled 

And the hand is chilled. 
Life's roses culled. 
And its tempests stilled; 
Then, ah, then! what then? 

TO AN ABSENT GUEST 

Dear friend, I was sorry when all were assembled 
Last night at our party to miss your sweet face. 

When for the last guest the old doorbell trembled, 
And you came not, alas, how vacant your place. 

Ah, Fate was unkind and conditions were sad — 

How we wish you had come, how we wish that you had. 

Now accept from us all the contents enclosed. 

The favors and cake and Santa Claus sorrow. 
Next time may the Fates be better disposed. 

And some happy meeting await us to-morrow. 
And when next year Christmas appears on the scene, 
Oh, may you be there to help hang out the green. 
Christmas, 1859. 

Couplets, mottoes and bits of verse a-many are found on 
the pages of the old albums. Here are a few culled at ran- 
dom: 

Some friendships like roses are doomed to wither, 
Others are twined of green live-for-ever. 

A kind soul's influence will spread 
Like treacle on hot gingerbread. 

The well-spent life is the only one that can ever come to a 
good and happy end. 



GRANDMOTHERS' ALBUMS 261 

Do the best your life will let you, 
And you'll get along, I'll bet you. 

A heart that's callous, hard and cold, 
Is as ice-cream shut in a mould. 

If you'll never trouble trouble till trouble troubles you. 
You'll save a mighty lot of it travelling this life through. 

No shoulder is strong enough to push aside the inevitable. 

Love is the only crowned king — 

A subject to himself alone; 
And what is still a stranger thing, 

He knows no empire but his own. 

Find one who does not trust in God, and that person is one 
who cannot be trusted by man. 

"Love not, love not, for the thing ye love may die," says the 
old song. But I say unto you, Love, love on, love much, love 
ever; and it will make your life blossom as the rose; for love is 
life, and life, if it is not love, is not worth living," but is cold 
and barren and death in life always. 

Youth pulls a strong bow and often shoots beyond the mark. 

Long, long ago, one darksome day, 
I heard my gray old grandam say 
One thing: I never yet have known 
Sorrow and grief to come alone. 
Single they never like to be. 
As all must learn with verity. 



XII 



A Last Chapter 



XII 



A Last Chapter 




[OOKING backward" has a fascination pecu- 
liarly its own. As I close these pages, there 
are crowding memories gathered and gar- 
nered I long still to add. The Warwick of 
over a century ago ! the Warwick of to-day — 
miguty is the contrast! In 1829 word reached the town 
that in England a locomotive called "The Rocket" had at- 
tained tiie incredible speed of fifteen miles an hour. The 
matter was discussed, and leading citizens decided the rumor 
must be false, as such a rate of speed was impossible. In 
the previous year died Dr. Benjamin S. Hoyt, one of our 
most memorable early citizens. He was postmaster many 
years, the mail bemg semi-weekly when he hrst took the 
ofhce. It was kept m his home, where the Baptist par- 
sonage now stands. He was a much loved physician and 
had artistic tastes, drawing, cutting silhouettes and pictures 
in sheets of paper with his penknife in a most wonderful 
manner. After his death his daughter Henrietta presented 
two of these framed to my aunt, one cut in a sheet of white 
paper laid over black, the other in red over white. The 
birds, flowers, churches, minarets, cherubs and silhouettes 
were exquisitely done. 

The wife of the Rev. Doctor Stewart, the Dutch Reformed 
minister, who at one time, with her daughters, Martha and 
Mary, kept a young ladies' select school in the old Hoi>'t 
house in the village, taught this work to her pupils. Dr. 
Hoyt also wrote, as was the custom of the day, an amusing 
epitaph and eulogy on his living wife and hung it over the 
chimney. John Morris Foght, Dr. Elisha Du Bois and 
others indulged in this dubious humor. I have heard our 
father repeat many of these old epitaphs, and greatly re- 
gret I failed to jot them down, as was my almost invariable 
custom. 



266 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

In early days the stage horn was the exhilaration of the 
town, as that cumbrous vehicle rolled up to the postoffice 
and deposited the mail. There was Davie Jones on his 
spotted pony, with his saddle bags, ready to receive it. In 
one side he stowed the Goshen papers, tlie Orange County 
Patriot, the Whig paper published by T. W. Crowell ; the 
Independent Republican, by James A. Cheeve, and in the 
other the few letters the villagers received. Davie supplied 
the eastern part of the town, going to Sugar Loaf, Chester, 
and as far as Washingtonville ; Noah Carpenter, a cripple, 
the M^estern district, himself, battered chair and wilful old 
mare, well-known figures, as far as Florida. Davie Jones 
and Spot, his pony, were both characters. Davie had ever 
a quip and jest for all, and a compliment and smile for every 
pretty girl. Spot once did duty in a circus, and never for- 
got it. An oldtime resident of genius and culture was 
John Morris Foght. He was an ardent patriot in the days 
of the Revolution. His old "still house" was fairly cov- 
ered with the work of his hand. On one of the broad doors 
was painted an American eagle with outspread wings ; above 
it floated the stars and stripes, and on a scroll in the eagle's 
beak was this motto, "Where Liberty dwells is my coun- 
trjy." On another door was a figure of Liberty, with Paul's 
immortal reply to the centurion, "But I was free-born" ; 
above her the star of Freedom, with six points, and under- 
neath, "If I lose thee I am indeed lost." We are told by a 
celebrated writer that "The town clerk made rhymed acros- 
tics for the Ladies of Society." Deacon Foght was a ready 
ihymer, and a contributor to the old albums. He inveighed 
vigorously against "the estate of honorable penury which 
the government reserved for its old soldiers." During 
Great Britain's outrages in 1811 a meeting was held at the 
house of Lewis F, Randolph to discuss the matter. Over 
fifty citizens from far and near were present. A pacific 
resident arose and iirged toleration and caution, even to 
making some concessions for the sake of peace. Up sprang 
a fiery old patriot, shouting, "I'll drink bilge water out of 
hell's ferryboat before I'll give in one inch to King George." 
Another weak brother told them that, as he was on his way 
to the meeting that evening, a great white angel stood on a 
rock by the wayside, and told him it would be useless to re- 
sist the King, as every effort against him would fail. A 
staunch patriot jumped to his feet and thundered, "If he 



A LAST CHAPTER 267 

was an angel he was a black one and he lied, and his fatlier, 
the devil, was a liar before him," No marvel these hery 
spirits carried all before them. 

It is worthy of note that eighty-three years ago, among 
five hundred and twenty-eight taxable inhabitants of the 
town of Warwick, Samuel S, Seward and Gabriel Wisner 
paid the largest taxes. Susan Bertholf, a colored woman, 
m tlie early twenties owned one-quarter of an acre of land 
in the township, upon which she paid taxes of hfty cents a 
year. In writing this book in nothing have I searched more 
diligently than into the condition of slavery in Orange 
County, and I find but one record like this : "A runaway 
named Jack, a very good reader," belonging to Nathan 
Hulse, 

On September 13th, 1827, a company was assembled for 
a convivial evening at a hotel in Warwick. A Mr. Wood, 
a relative of Mrs. James Benedict, was present from New 
York City. He had with him a copy of a paper with an 
item stating that Charles Carroll, of Carrollton, had given 
seventy thousand dollars toward the building of the Mary- 
land and Ohio Railroad. A well-known citizen present 
jumped to his feet and said, "That's a whopper; no man 
ever had as much money as that, and I don't believe it no 
more than I believe Ki Loat when he told here last week 
that Deacon Sloan's old yow down to Honey Pot had five 
lambs at one hatching. There ain't so much money to a 
man nor lambs to a yow." 

Among a dozen farms offered for sale in Orange County 
in 1806, all but three are mentioned as having roomy, com- 
fortable log houses. The only New York City newspaper 
which came to our town regularly over a century ago was 
called The Watch Tozver. Its publisher was James Cheet- 
ham, "price $2j/^ per year, postage paid by subscriber." 

Early in 1800 the beautiful horses Tippoo Saib and Nestor 
were brought to Warwick. The first won laurels at the 
Newmarket and Harlem races. Both were from Old Mes- 
senger, Nestor's mother from Eclipse. Our father had a 
team descended from Nestor, Jack and Selim, perfectly 
matched, of great beaul^y. Selim was very fast. In 1827 
so high ran party feeling in Warwick between the Jackson 
and Adams factions that a meeting was called warning 
voters against the baleful effects of intemperate partyism. 
Every Jackson man had a hickory pole in his yard. Merry 



268 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

times had our ancestors in their journeys to New York City 
by stage and by sloop aown the JdLuason, ere the Erie was 
uiougnc oi. ine stages oi lienjaimn iirauner, ol U-osiien, 
ran to i\ew York, Aioany, iNewDurgii and iiaston. Liiairs 
were on iiire lor tne staiu poriion oi tiie conununity. Manjy 
a merry junket was iield on tne good sloops as tliey glided 
down tlie noble Hudson. A lavorite was tlie Montgomery, 
owned by Jacob and 1 nomas jfowell, tienjamin Case, mas- 
ter. Tlie uaty Maria, bally Jane, l^armers bon, Jfanny, 
Sportsman and Jacket hoated up and down with jolly loads 
and produce. 

Young ministers entering on their work did not have easy 
times m primitive days, i^lder Zelotus Grenelle used to re- 
late that when a trembling' candidate for ordination, Elder 
Eebbeus Eathrop strode up to him and, taking him by the 
shoulder, said, "Come around here where i can look you in 
the face, while God looks you in the heart." When preach- 
ing his hrst sermon the old Elder, seated in front of the pul- 
pit, cahed out, "Young man, you are wrong!" Eider 
Grenelle declared he was so abashed his knees smote to- 
gether and he sank to his seat. Doctors Thomas G. Evans 
and Eewis Dunning were among physicians sometimes 
called to Warwick from Goshen in consultation in the long 
ago. The Orange County Fire Insurance Company, having 
offices at 42 Wall street. New York, advertised a capital of 
$400,000 in 1826, with thirteen directors. Lotteries were 
widely advertised in the county papers, the Black River 
Lottery having five drawings in one issue. In 1803 an itin- 
erant fund was voted in the Baptist Association, and James 
Burt was made treasurer of the fund. 

On July 4th, 1857, the pupils of the Academy at Warwick 
decided on a celebration. They had no flag, and resolved 
to make one. None procurable was forthcoming in the 
village for a pattern, nor did anjy person know precisely how 
to make it. Our father was then owner of the Wawayanda 
House. The teachers and about thirty pupils of the Acad- 
emy had their home there. Mr. Spencer Palmer procured 
for us the red, white and blue. It lay heaped on the table. 
Puzzling was the dilemma ! In the midst of our cogita- 
tions the stage set down at the storied old house Captain 
Tomsey, of Brooklyn, a hearty old sea dog, on a visit to his 
son James, a pupil at our home. He was immediately 
made acquainted with our perplexity, and that nobody knew 



A LAST CHAPTER 269 

exactly how to begin the work. In a trice we were in the 
study and the bluff old salt had a correct picture of Old 
Gloriy on the blackboard. Mrs. W. L. Benedict, assisted by 
the teachers, soon completed it, and the jovial captain, fol- 
lowed by the trooping school, bore it to the upper piazza 
and unfurled it to the breeze, exclaiming, "There, boys and 
girls, is your country's flag. The red stands for the blood 
shed for your liberties, the white for the pure principles 
fought for, blue for the heaven you pray to, and the stars 
for the brotherhood of our States." His rugged, weather- 
beaten face worked with emotion, his voice choked, his hon- 
est eyes were full of tears. Over fifty scholars stood around 
him and sent up a shout that made the welkin ring. He 
then made an address to them. I recall he said the May- 
flower came over under King James's flag, and that we did 
not have our glorious star spangled banner until 1777. Giv- 
ing it a last wave he said, "Love it, boys ; fight for it to the 
last ditch, and never be a traitor to it." It was next morn- 
ing borne triumphantly to the Academy for the exercises 
there. In how very short a time five who stood around the 
grand old captain that day laid down their bright young 
lives for it ! 

Deacon James Burt, of Warwick, used to relate a stirring 
incident which he witnessed at the first Baptist Church at 
Warwick at the outbreak of the Revolution. He said: "I 
went to meeting with my father and uncle Whitney. Elder 
Benedict was praving and we stopped in the door. He 
prayed verv earnestlv for the King and that no weapon 
forged against his majestv might prosper." At this point 
his uncle Whitnev wheeled about toward his father and 
said aloud, "What, is the devil in the man?" He was 
greatlv perturbed and was with difiiculty quieted. 

On the Fourth of Julv. 1844, a grand celebration of Free- 
dom was held in the Baptist church at Warwick. Two 
original odes, composed bv Mr. W. L. Benedict, were sung, 
one commencine "Favored sons of noble sires." to the tune 
of "Hail Columbia" ; the other "Cruel oppression ruled our 
land." A verv large choir, composed of the best singers in 
the country, officiated. Prominent clergvmen offered 
prayer, addresses breathing the fire and spirit of patriotism 
were made bv orators from the countv and bv mari^v resi- 
dents, some of them of the fine old militia. The old church 
was literally packed, the aisles, portals and yard crowded. 



270 UNDER OLD ROOFTREES 

At the close of the exercises the venerable James Burt arose. 
He was eighty-four years old, one of the last of our Revo- 
lutionary veterans. The scene stirred his blood. In sol- 
emn, trembling tones he recited how dearly our liberties 
were bought by the fathers, and besought those present who 
were walking in their footsteps to reverently prize them. 
Extending his withered hands, he cried, "Let the watch- 
word of all be 'First my God, then my country.' " Scarcely 
had Warwick witnessed a more affecting or dramatic scene. 
Women wept unrestrainedly. Tears wet the cheeks of 
strong men. Fire shone in the kindled eyes of the young. 
"I would die for my country" was written on every face. 

A panther once trailed Philip Ketchum on the property 
now called the Guion estate. It was a moonlight night ; he 
was returning home from a call on his inamorata, and, look- 
ing behind him, saw the stealthy beast on his track. He 
had no arms, but a package of powder in his pocket. Pour- 
ing it out, he rubbed it with his heavy soles along the path, 
walking backward. The beast followed surely but slowly 
until it came to the powder, scented it suspiciously, and 
slunk away. All the town was on the hunt. It was shot 
four days after by a Mr. De Graw in Bellvale Mountain. 
In the year 1827 our mother went with her parents for a 
visit to a relative living where now the beautiful estate of 
Mr. E. H. Harriman lies. It was early in the winter, a 
snow had fallen, and they drove over in a sleigh. During 
her stay the hams and shoulders from six fat porkers were 
hung in the smoke-house, a staunch log building, to under- 
go a curing by hickory chips. In the night a terrible com- 
motion was heard outside, and the family were roused to 
find seven gaunt wolves yelping, leaping and tearing at the 
smoke-house. Guns were quickly procured and three were 
shot, the rest escaping to the woods. 

A farmstead cellar of the olden days at the approach of 
winter would be an alluring sight to the eyes of many a 
straitened housewife in these. Let me give a picture of one 
I hold in memory: The meat from fifteen corn-fed hogs, 
in hams, shoulders, sausage, head cheese, pork ; numerous 
stone jars preserving in lard chops, tenderloin and roasts. 
Beef from two mighty bovines weighing hundreds. Several 
firkins of butter, each containing from fifty to eighty pounds. 
Casks of cider and pear sauce. Barrels of delicious sweet 
cider and amber pure vinegar. Boxes of eggs packed in 



A LAST CHAPTER 271 

wheaten bran. Bins of choicest apples. Honey dripping 
sweetness, only surpassed by the contents of the jugs of de- 
licious maple syrup. Jellies of apple, cherry, plum, peach, 
and the riotous wild grape fill the shelves of the old cup- 
boards, looming darkly from webbed corners. Then the 
garret, with nuts, dried fruit and savory herbs, and the 
meal-room with wheat, rye and buckwheat flour and corn- 
meal, sack crowding sack. And this is the way they win- 
tered in the good old days. 

In the year 1813 Lewis F. Randolph purchased of An- 
drew Hathorn nine acres of land in Warwick, for which 
he paid $30. The witnesses to the purchase were Peter F. 
Hathorn and Thomas PL Burt. The youngest mother I 
have traced in old Warwick was Mrs. Andrew Houston. 
She was married at eleven years of age, and her son, Col. 
W. W. Houston, was born when she was twelve. The 
strongest man was John Wood. He could lift with his 
single right arm a chair from the floor holding a man weigh- 
ing iqo potmds. The smallest woman was Bettv Smallev. 
The largest child was born in the 1700's in the Sanfordville 
district to a Mrs. Decker. It weisfhed 21 pounds. The 
mother and father were both over six feet tall. 

As I pass from under the old rooftrees and gently let 
fall the latch of each door. I feel I part with o-oodlv com- 
pany. For many months I have been a guest at the familiar 
hearths, have heard the stories of their roman'^e. tragedv, 
pathos and humor. Those e'athered around have never 
wearied in the telling. As I finish, a great sea fog arises 
"on broad grav wings of gloom" and settles down on the 
noble harbor, the sparklinsr bavs and shining rivers of mv 
adopted home. A salt breath of the sea steals in and I 
feel resfretfullv I am not on mv "native heath." where'! 
earnestlv wished to write these pas'es. There must still lie 
hoarded recollections rich in interest vet untouched. I lonsfed 
to JTather. A mist of foreetfulness. dense as the one now 
enshroudinfr mv view, was blotting out manv personalities 
and scene*; Avorthv to be preserved and cherished. I have 
endenvored to draw pside its curtnin, and trust in so doing; I 
shall awaken a deeper interest in our loyal, courageous, steadfast 
fathers ; our faithful, loving mothers. May we their children 
keep their""memories green, and the voices of the past be 
pleasant to our ears ! 



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